When Death Arrives Outside Your Window.
A reflection on the human response to death amidst faulty vision.
I was walking down the stairs when I heard a thud against the window. It was loud and disconcerting — I’d never heard anything like it before. Thinking it was a ball thrown over into our yard from our neighbour, I hurriedly approached the scene. I soon gathered that what lay in front of me was not a ball of any sort. In fact, it was quite the opposite. A dead bird. Knocked clean by its encounter with the glass window. It lay prostrate on the ground at an awkward angle: its head faced downwards while its feet dangled up in the air. Remnants of its collision with the glass were still visible. I could only gawk as white feathers floated down from the smear of the window.
I gasped in horror. What was terrifying wasn’t only the prospect of having to discard its body, but that an actual bird had actually died outside my actual property. Death. It was so sudden, so unexpected, and it was there.
One question that lingered in my brain after the incident was: Why did it fly into the window so forcefully? The thud I’d heard was above the decibel range I’d expected, and its effects were still wearing me down. The image of the dead bird was unsightly, but what irritated me was not knowing why the bird had dived headfirst into the window at such immense force and speed in the first place. Was there something inside the house that attracted it? What did it see that I couldn’t?
It may seem ridiculous that I’m placing so much emphasis on a bird’s death. A soulless — and now, lifeless — bird. But a chord struck in me that day:
Death, no matter the form, the subject, nor the cause, has an impact.
It always does. The loss of life is never pleasant. Our feelings remain valid. I believe I’m correct when I say there’s been an awful lot of it, especially as of late. First, it was the death of diplomatic relations between the US and Iran, later Australian forests, then the tragedy that took away Kobe Bryant, his daughter, and everyone else on the helicopter. Let’s not forget the communal riots in Delhi, the floods in Indonesia, and of course, the novel coronavirus pandemic. More recently, it was the death of George Floyd. He is most certainly not the first subject to irrational death, and he may not be the last. But, this death brought about a movement for the death of another: systemic racism.
In any case, we, as humans with working consciences, should have a response to death. It shouldn’t be of indifference to us. It isn’t human to look at the loss of life and not have it register in our mind as even slightly saddening.
Unfortunately, many of us do. Many of us have fallen victim to the desensitisation of violence, so much so that it’s become routine. We accept death as normal and take it in stride. That’s just life. It’s unfair, sometimes.
But how much longer can we keep saying that? What will it take for us to respond to death? Maybe it isn’t until it truly hits home that we begin to feel its impacts. Is it only then that we weep? Only then that we sympathise? Only then when we seek comfort from the world and find that we’re staring into a reflection of ourselves — cold, heartless, unsympathetic, inhumane?
Of course, response does not have to be performative. There is no mandate for our response to be noticed by others, “Yeah, she’s responding the right way. She’s grieving.” In fact, I’d encourage quite the opposite. An inner response, just enough so that we have acknowledged the death in the room, is more than enough.
The shortest verse in the Bible lies in John 11:35, and it says just two words, “Jesus wept.” This was in response to Lazarus’ death. At first, we question. How is it that the God of our Universe, the Creator of every living thing, the Saviour of all mankind, could succumb to such pitiful emotions like the rest of humanity? Wouldn’t our God know better, that Lazarus would go to heaven eventually? And if God was so powerful, couldn’t he just raise Lazarus up from the dead so he could be with him again? (Spoiler alert: he did) But there is a reason why Jesus humbled himself in raw emotion. There is a reason why he wept publicly, and why this very small detail was noted in the Bible as God’s Word. It is to signify humanity, raw humanity. Jesus, as our example, showed us that it is okay to cry. The truth is that death is a sad affair. It is normal and completely healthy to mourn over the death of a loved one. There is a time for everything: a time for grieving that will eventually turn into a time for joy. A time for suffering that will eventually turn into a time for peace. Time is cyclical, and there is a time reserved for everything. Death justifies our sadness. Jesus taught us, in those two simple words, that we should have a response towards death. He wasn’t indifferent to it, even though he knew he could raise Lazarus up any time he wanted. He embraced the feelings that arose in the wake of his death, and we should too.
However, as in everything, there must be a balance. While we should have a response to death, we must not let it control us completely. Idolising death seems like an exaggerated statement, but some of us do it every day. Sometimes, our response to death is just utter sadness, bitterness, anger, regret. Something has been stolen from us, and we’re blind with rage. It could be the death of a family member to natural causes, the genocide of an entire race, or even the murder of a black man.
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.” — Martin Luther King Jr.
When we let our emotions overwhelm us, we no longer are in control. We lose our temper, lose rationality, and ultimately lose ourselves in the chaos. What we don’t realise is that this rage can blindside us. We act upon our feelings, instantaneously, and our thinking is obscured by the reactions around us.
The bird that died flying into the window had likely seen something past the glass that it fancied. Thinking what lay ahead was the best path forward, it saw only the reflection of the glass rather than the glass itself. Like the bird, we often dive headfirst into what we think is best for us but is—in fact—a terrible reality. We are blind sighted by whatever desires lie ahead. However, we forget that sometimes, what we see isn’t really there. And most of the times, we believe we’re making the right decision. We’re so consumed with our own will, our own desires, that we forfeit everything else to pursue it.
It works both ways: narrow-sighted and far-sighted. The former finds us in circumstances where we narrow our vision to short-term gratification. We devote incredible effort into pursuing that one thing that lies in front of us, we rarely pause and observe its long-term consequences. Our vision is obscured because there is something enticing, luring, and tempting blocking the rest of the path.
Similarly, the latter entices us with the end goal in mind. Our far-sightedness leads us on, placing all our hopes in the one goal, and we choose to invest more than we can afford into that faraway vision—which, at the time, had probably seemed a lot closer than it was. When we allow ourselves to become engrossed with these faulty lines of vision, we become like the bird. We don’t see the glass. We dive headfirst, acting on our emotions. And we enter a terrible reality, sometimes even unintentional suicide.
The pitiful death of a bird triggered in me a powerful response that day. Even though I’d never cared much for bird-watching, seeing the forced repose of the flightless creature stimulated sorrow. It was a reminder not only of the sad affair of death, but also the stewardship of our time. Quick, harrowing, impulsive decisions in life are symptoms of faulty vision; instead, let us take it pace by pace, steady, and considerate.
And hopefully, by living life in this manner, we’ll never hear the thud, a few decibels too loud, too late.
I write about books, culture, and current affairs under an international youth lens. Feel free to read more of my work Zera T.on Medium.
