Terri Schiavo has died – Mar 31, 2005
Apparently Michael Schiavo was an ass to the end, but that drama belongs to that family and not to us. Much as the whole situation belonged to that family and not to us.
My grandpa had a feeding tube and a respirator. The respirator was weaned and the feeding tube was pulled because pops was the guardian and DNRed the nurses into unplugging. Where the fuck was CNN then. Oh wait, his family (grudgingly) recognized it was time to go without hysterics. They fought for about 48 hours over pulling the plug, in order that some of his homies could drop by for a sendoff. I didn’t get to say goodbye – they didn’t wait long to DNR him, and he couldn’t continue for more than a day without the appliances, but that is life, baby. It’s not about lawyers or courts or famewhore politicians. Just you, your god and your destiny.
I was listening to some Catholic priest dude on NPR last night, and he made sense. That church’s position is that sometimes it’s time to be dead. Technology may prolong things, and your people may not want to accept the inevitable, but sometimes god says “get over here,” and you need to just go. Schiavo got the call 15 years ago. Can everybody finally just let her be gone…
Why was Michael Schiavo an ass?
Within his rights? Sure. Classless? That, too. Seemed gratuitously jerkweedish to shut out the family at the end, bitter legal fights aside.
I’ve run like wildfire away from most blog postings on this situation. Yours I read. I like it’s point of view and brevity.
Thanks.