Energy, neither created, nor destroyed.

2011 has brought a lot of reflection on life and on death. The more people who pass, the less I find myself comforted by the practices of religion. Not that I've ever been devoted to any particular faith, but it seems counterintuitive, doesn't it? The more I think about death, the more I rely on science, as I'm infinitely more at ease with the idea that our energies breakdown and shift to create other forms of life. That energy has to come somewhere, doesn't it?

When someone dies, where does their light go? You know, the light - the thing that makes their eyes bright and their smile warm. The thing that is delicately detectable when that person walks into a room. Where does that go? And for that matter, what sort of chemistry makes that reaction to a single soul possible?

When you see that person void of their light, void of their motion, lying still in a serenely pretty box, the word "gone" takes on a whole new perspective. I have never been more sure in my life that the body has very little to do with the soul. A wonderful union, yes, but very separate.