What is Dying?

     I am standing upon the seashore. A ship at my side spreads her white sails to the morning breeze and starts for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength and i stand and watch her until at length she hangs like a speck of white cloud, just where the sea and sky come down to mingle with each other.
     Someone at my side says, "There, she is gone."
      Gone where? Gone from my sight- that is all. She is just as large in mast and hull and spar as she was when she left my side, and just as able to bear her load of living freight to the place of destination. Her diminished size is in me, not in her. Just at the moment when someone says, "There, she is gone," there are other eyes watching her coming and other voices ready to take up the glad shout, "There she comes!"
      And that is dying.                                           -Henry Van Dyke

   I came across this reading recently, and thought i would post it. Sometimes its as if we need to take a look at death maybe from a different perspective. Nevertheless it is still a sad thing. Yesterday my friend's, (Mindy), dad passed away, from a sudden heart attack.Her father was George Friesen and they are from Grant, Nebraska. She is my age, and her dad my dad's age. Its a sobering thing, and I would like to request you all to pray for her and her family as they go through this time of grief.

...peace...