Unlike many other people, I have no desire to live forever, either in the corporeal realm or as some ethereal presence of Pure Spirit. I rather look forward to my eventual disappearance from Being (I mean, just how much happiness can one person take?), I just don't want it to be anytime soon, and I don't relish the transitional stage, the dying part, however brief it may be. If dying is an art, then it goes without saying that some deaths are more artful than others. I would rather like to suffer from a brief illness, time enough for my loved ones to fly in from the far corners of the globe (one hopes to attract intercontinentally, it's such an ego boost) to ring my bed, the deathbed, their forlorn faces surrounding me in an Exalted Semicircle of Love. The awareness that my unexpected passing is causing wrenching emotional pain would of course delight me, despite my public statements to the contrary. Their red-rimmed eyes, evidence of weeping and sleeplessness, would simultaneously concern and reassure me, finally the validation of my importance to them that I never quite believed in times of wellness. Too bad I won't be around to use my new supercharged, fuel injected self-esteem for anything personally meaningful. I could've used it when zero confidence and complete lack of faith in myself prevented me from achieving anything important. Why can't people sob and wail over you when an exhibition of their absolute torment would do you some good?

So that's a good way to go, in my book. There are others. Dying heroically is always a nice idea. Dying in your sleep is certainly better than a lot of other ways. Here are some ways I most certainly do not want to die:

• Burning to death. Death by fire (not smoke inhalation, totally different ballgame) is something I've always feared, I used to have nightmares about it.
• Drowning. Another one I really fear. I can have a kind of anxiety attack just thinking about it too long.
• Embarrassing accident. You know, tripped and fell for no reason, slipped in the shower, mistook rat poison for parmesan cheese, stupid stuff like that. Something so ridiculous that it makes people chuckle a little to recall it. If anyone is capable of being humiliated from beyond the grave, it would probably be me.
• Falling from a great height. I get the willies thinking about falling out of a window or other high place. Those moments when you're descending, arms pinwheeling, completely aware of your impending demise, it fills me with dread and horror.
• Airplane crash. Enough said, we all know this fear. That agonizing spiral descent, the screaming passengers, smoke filling the cabin. Too, too much. Some little turd finding my charred torso in a smoldering field, showing it to his bucktoothed friends, the indignity!