Friday, August 7, 2015

The Wise Old Man and the Ladder

An old man sees a ladder on the street and begins to climb. He's up a few rungs and an onlooker says, "What are you doing? You might hurt yourself if you fall." The old man replies, "The ladder is like our debt. If coming down might hurt me, then I better keep going up." The onlooker is not quite sure to make of it. His reasoning, at least on some level, seems to make sense.

The old man continues to climb. The onlooker yells, "If you fall now it could kill you!" The old man replies, "It could kill me, yes. My plan is sound. Like our debt, up is the only direction that makes sense." The onlooker is dumbfounded as he ponders what is happening. Should he call 911? Yes? No?

The old man continues to climb. The onlooker screams, "If you fall now, you will die!" The old man's last words were, "That's great news! I have stage IV pancreatic cancer and I live in the f%^king Bible Belt!! I would have told you sooner but was afraid you might try to rescue me!!" The onlooker, being a God fearing man who just realized he'd been tricked, exclaimed, "Go to hell!" And he meant it, with every fiber of his being.

About 15 years ago, my dog died of mouth cancer. It was a very sad day when we had to put her down. May someone show me the same amount of mercy someday. There are things worse than death. I most definitely did not "murder" my dog.

See Also:
Bumper Sticker: Euthanasia Is Murder

7 comments:

Karlo said...

I couldn't have predicted where that post was going. (:

Stagflationary Mark said...

Yeah, my worst nightmare isn't a debt bubble that pops. It isn't even dying by falling from a very tall ladder. It's being in extreme terminal agony and being too weak to climb the ladder. Seriously.

And why might I be trying to climb it? Because somebody else's religious beliefs conflict with my own. What an awful way to go. Sigh.

Stagflationary Mark said...

And as I have said before, I am an agnostic with seriously atheist tendencies.

I therefore do not believe that I would go to hell for wanting to someday die in peace, and even if I am wrong, what a horrible place heaven must be for penalizing those wishing to end unbearable pain.

Karlo said...

I'm atheist but can understand your feelings on this. It brings comfort to think that we have some control over how our lives end.

Stagflationary Mark said...

It would seem that we're both modern day heretics. It's one reason that I consider myself very fortunate to have been born when and where I was. People have been burned on the stake for saying less. Sigh.

dearieme said...

I note that oncologists who almost always recommend chemotherapy for their patients often choose themselves to go without. Maybe they have the added advantage of being able to trust that throe colleagues will pump them full of morphine.

Stagflationary Mark said...

dearieme,

Why does that not surprise me?