I don't mean like Mel Gibson (in his portrayal of William Wallace) screaming "freedom!" right before he was hanged and vivisected. I mean like if you found out you had terminal cancer in 2010 and expected it to kill you "sometime in 2011 or early 2012".
I don't even know how to write about this, because it is so crushing.
I found this webcomic linked from the website of a (then) dying author. Derek K. Miller was a father, a husband, and a writer. He knew his cancer was terminal and stopped chemotherapy and opted for palliative care. He was lucky enough (as lucky as you can be at the end of your life) to plan his final moments in life, whenever those moments would make themselves known.
He wrote what would be his last words to his family and to the world, and asked his family and friends to publish them after he died. It is heartbreaking. It is beautiful. Reading it gives him life in the only way we could ever be guaranteed after our bodies are finished.
He spent his last 1400 words writing about his aspirations as a youth, about his life, about being afraid of "the process of dying" but not death itself, about his love and dream for his daughters, and about the love for his wife. It was his wife to which he wrote his final words. The words he most wanted to outlive him.
"I loved you deeply, I loved you, I loved you, I loved you."
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