SOMETHING IN THE AIR

A response to Falconer's Commission on Assisted Dying
by Nikki Kenward

You know, telly is a vapid entity a lot of the time, it doesn't move you to much, it doesn't shake you up or for that matter shake anyone up. Anything goes; nowadays it's usually us- dancing, singing, being ill, fat, nuts or allergic to nuts. The Jeremy Kyleletts of this world are trudged out, lost, fecund and generally toothless, the people who time will forget and who the government have certainly forgotten.

And then once in a blue tube something comes along that reminds us of the arbitrary nature of being here, being alive that is. And so it was that, being planted abed again, having imbibed the usual diet I came across, Restoration Man, another of those dam programmes (that I watch avidly, by the way) that show couples, usually with more money than sense building 'the dream home.'

This was Pete and Nikki breathing life into an old windmill that they had inherited, for them and their children. I was just about to start with the green eyed monster when Pete delivered some startling news to George Clark the programme's front man. Nikki, a mum in her early thirties, I would say, had just been told for the second time that she had cancer, only this time it was terminal. I stopped carping for a minute; there was a silence, that most people probably missed. Missed because most of us will never know what it's like to be faced with devastation like this. The sort that doesn't come at you from the side or behind, the sort that smacks you straight in the face and takes your breath away. I know this sort, although most of me survived unlike Nikki.

From here on 'breathing life' into the build took on a totally different meaning. Those new sails turned on one of this lovely ladies last days. This remarkable house is a tribute not only to her but to the gang who sweated tears and blood with her to make it happen in time, in her time. Why? Because they cared, we care. We are human. We don't exist in a bubble or be it "an island," as the wise Mr. Donne knew years ago. We want to show love, they the ordinary guys building the house wanted to show this lady how much they could care, given the opportunity. And they and her family became extraordinary, because of this untimely, sad, unfair, hard and human death, people became human. Became loving, kind, committed, sad, oh so sad, they rose to heights life makes us capable of when we show who we are and who we really want to be.

Now step back a minute to silly Pratchetts 'kindly' doctor or doctors, me thinks two might be pushing it. However there they are offering Nikki the golden chalice, not long to live, been here before, knows the ropes. Do the right thing, save your family all that heartache, don't hang about. Then there's the cost, the terrible cost of it all. Nikki's a nurse, she knows exactly how many people she could help by saving on those last treatments, those last useless hopes. After all lots of people are doing it now. You can't afford to be different, we can't afford for you to be different.

But she was and let me tell you why. Why all those who oppose this dreadful pack of lies dressed to look like caring, pretending to look like the right to choose. Why we know what you are and what you really want.

There you all are with your so called dignity in dying, faking the end like it would be easy, something you could walk away from. What fools you all are. What hospital hoers will you use to guarantee the quick buck. What 'trickery' is this that tells us it is 'much ado' for nothing. A 'nothing' that will be added to someone's pile, someone's hoard. Then, that someone had better be sleeping easy and not hear the toll of that bell when the chalice is handed to them and there's no going back. Even Falconer has refused the cup, back tracked, maybe he saw the shadow of the Grim reaper in one of his conspirators faces.

No, Nikki was different because she knew love, because she breathed life, yes life, into those old stones. She gave life to the sails that now warm her house and she gave the gift of life to all those who went on her journey with her. There was something in the air and on the air, that night in my very familiar bedroom, we dare to call it love.

For the others, there is no journey, there is no love, just a moment of going - stale, heartless, clinical and oh so lonely.