Why I blame Antonio Banderas for the way I am thinking

I’ve been thinking about my death a lot this week. I blame it on Antonio Banderas.

I read an interview with him in the Guardian about his work on Picasso in which he said, “I don’t want to live like I’m already dead. I’m just going to live it, and if I die, I die.”

Antonio’s words stuck in my mind. And not for the first time on this subject.

One of my most favourite quotes attributed to him is about his meeting with God after death.

“What do you think God will say to you,” Antonio was asked by an interviewer.

“Well, I think he will say, ‘Antonio, did you have fun?’ And I will say, ‘ Oh yes, it was wonderful.”

“And what do you think God will say next?” asked the interviewer.

“Well, I hope he says, ‘Would you like to have more?’ And I will say, ‘Oh yes please!”

I don’t want to sound morbid or maudlin but I have been thinking about my death and how sad I will be to go.

Death is, of course, inevitable. It is going to happen. Death and taxes, right. Something is going to get me, get us all, sooner or later.

It is not the inevitability that upsets me, although, of course, I naturally hate the idea of pain and suffering. I agree totally with Woody Allen who said, “I am not afraid of death, I just don’t want to be there when it happens.”

No, what has been occupying my mind is that I just think the world is so beautiful that it feels impossible to have to leave it.

There are just so many, many things that make me thrilled to be in the world – my beautiful grandchildren, beautiful flowers, well, beauty everywhere – my wife, friends, children and on and on. I’m with Antonio on this. “Did you have fun? Oh, yes, it is wonderful.”

How impossible it will be to say goodbye.

I was in Whole Foods the other day and just the abundance of beautiful vegetables and flowers and great smells and the joyfulness of the people shopping and serving brought a tear to my eye. Go figure. It was such a beautiful scene of life bustling and brimming with beauty and freshness and energy. It was lovely.

Sometimes, I actually think that it must be excruciating for the French or Italians to die – worse than it is for any of us. Why? Well, because they live so close to so much that is gorgeous and wonderful all the time that it simply must hurt more to leave it all behind.

But then I look up at our beautiful mountains here in Vancouver and I breathe the clean, sweet air and I look at the happy faces of children and I think it must be the same for everyone, everywhere – beauty is not isolated to one place; it is universal and everyone can be touched by it every day wherever they are.

Last week, I jotted down these words.

Today I saw magnolia trees

in full bloom.

And leaves on chestnut trees

just starting to unfurl.

I thought:

There is no good time to die.

The world is too beautiful.

When could it ever be the

right time to die.

I will cry forever when the time

comes to say goodbye.

swhysall@hotmail.com