How do you cope with an awareness of impending death -- inside?

Most of us know the things to say when we go to a funeral. However, at least for me, I often feel differently inside than I am able to express externally.

There are times when grief has been overwhelming and times when I have been unable to stop crying. There are other times when I feel like, well, this is sad and all, but I’m not feeling overwhelmed. It’s a shame. I wish you hadn’t gone. But it’s not going to be such a huge thing for me.

There are times when I suddenly think of someone who is gone and I sort of have this wish I could see them again, but then I know I can’t, so what’s the point? So maybe I’ll just think about them for a while until something else takes my thoughts.

But the reason I thought of this was that I saw a colleague coming out of the men’s room and he was limping along, using his cane. I had this sudden feeling that he might not be around much longer and then I wondered if anyone would tell me if he was gone. This is an issue because he is in a different department, and these announcements don’t seem to reach me a lot of the time.

I don’t even know who sends them out, if they get sent out at all. Mostly it seems like it’s word of mouth, and since it isn’t my department, maybe the word of mouth won’t reach me.

I’m at an age where people are starting to die. People my age. Right now, it’s mostly cancer, which makes it feel like people died too soon.

It’s strange, now I think about it. There are probably 20 or 30 men on my floor, but I tend to see maybe three or four of them, regularly, in the men’s room. Are these the guys who pee a lot? Are they the ones with prostrate issues? Do they also take meds, like me, that cause a lot of peeing? Are we men with health issues—men who might not be around as long as others?

I don’t know what to think. It makes me a bit melancholy. Should we reach out to each other? Or are we old dogs who are slowly separating ourselves from the pack and we don’t really want to connect any more?

I think it matters, but I don’t know what to do about it. Don’t know if I want to do anything about it. Other than, inside, to acknowledge that life changes, and we who have seen more life now than we are likely to see in the future are just being reminded of that, increasingly often.

We are all further or closer to death and I doubt if many have much idea exactly how far away it is. Do you think about it? If so, how does that train of thought go, for you, at this moment in your life?