Media Vita in Morte Sumus

I'm walking out of the stock room at work, out into the omnidirectional light of the sales floor - I'm tired after a long day, and I take a deep breath, noting with a certain stoicism the parts of my body that are starting to feel worn down: knees, back, feet, wrists, etc., etc., etc. 

It occurs to me that, at some point, parts of me will stop working entirely, and then more parts, and eventually the day will come when I will close my eyes and they will simply never again reopen, and "I" will be no more.

This is not news, of course, but for the first time in a while I find my self feeling the fact of my eventual non-existence, and it thrills through me with the anticipation of going up a roller coaster - a thin thread of fear knotted right in my belly with a sort of wonder and amazement. I can almost see the darkness that is right on the other side of life, but as soon as I do, the part of me that is alive and demands that I continue to be so thrusts the thought away with both hands, and I am back in the waking world, holding a box of shoes, walking on the tile floor, doing my job, getting through the day, happy to be here, but a little disappointed, as if I almost remembered something, then forgot it again.