I watched Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade tonight with some good friends of mine (movies with people you love is always a good thing, right?).  When we reached the scene near the end where the old guy dies horribly by drinking from the “wrong” grail, I remarked that my mom had said, “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust” when we first watched this movie.  That scene gave me nightmares, not because of the scene itself but because after hearing my mother say that, I realized my own mortality for the first time I can remember.  That’s what death is in all it’s ugliness and horror.

My mom, as anyone who has met her would agree, is a kind soul and didn’t say these  words to scare me and probably didn’t even conceive that I would freak out a bit after hearing them in that context.  So I don’t want to paint her as a horrible person who scares children.  But ahouseholdkate and eclectic nerdery both agreed that I needed to post this story, particularly as it is Lent and this is a time we can use to reflect on mortality.

So when did you first realize that you would one day die?  How did it happen?  Has it happened yet?