Going peacefully to the unknown falls

I just had a dream which seems to have borrowed concepts from Meet Joe Black, Dead Like Me, What Dreams May Come, and the like.  It went something like this:

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I had known it was coming, for some reason.  My friend Clint was tasked with passing people from this life.  With a touch, usually unexpected, they slipped away.  With me, we knew it was coming.  The perks of having your friend be a reaper, I guess.  I knew the fast-approaching day and time.

As it approached, my preparations had nothing to do with having wild new experiences and eating amazing food.   I just spent low-key time with people I wanted to spend time with.  I wasn't to indicate I was 'leaving', so I pretty much carried on as normal.  I called people I hadn't spoken with in a while.  Most notably, I expressed affection more freely and let the little frictions go.  I hugged without the fear of how someone might interpret it or what awkwardness might result down the road.  I didn't care.  My road was taking me elsewhere.  I wanted them to know that I cared, and I needn't fear any pain I might feel by them abusing or disregarding that affection since I was leaving anyway.

The days leading up to the event are blurry.  I remember, though, the day.  I was in a classroom of some sort, college-style, and the class was dismissed with a bell.  My first instinct was to gather my things, pack my backpack in a hurry, and head off to whatever important things I had to attend to.  Except...this was the place.  I more casually packed up, walked calmly with my bag to the corner of the room by large bay windows, and set my backpack down on a couch there, where Clint and another friend were waiting for me solemnly but not somber.  I watch the dozens of people filter out, going on with their indefinite lives as I prepared to leave mine within the hour, and chatted with my friends as usual.  I suddenly thought, "Oh, I can't just leave my backpack laying around, I need to make sure my stuff's not going to be a burden to anyone, I..."  It dawned on me none of it mattered.  Someone would take care of all of that.  It was too late to concern myself with such details; now was a time to just...let it all go.  I looked at my backpack, my life in a bag, and I realized I'd never be picking it up again.  My mind went back to the images stored on the hard drive in the computer in that bag: a lifetime of snapshots I'd reviewed to refresh all of my memories, my life flashing before my eyes as it were.  There was no such thing as tying up all loose ends.  I accepted that.

I was admittedly a bit nervous.  My heart was racing just a bit, but as I looked out the window, I saw an expansive view of a richly salmon-hued sunset over a large and gorgeous body of water dotted by sailboats and lined across the far side by majestically rugged mountains and the near side by lush evergreen forest surrounding creamy beaches gently lapped by clear, turquoise water.  It was a conglomeration of all of the places which have 'taken me to my happy place', brought peace, and been home.  It reassured me that this was to be a peaceful process.  On the far right side from my vantage point, the large body of water spilled through an opening in the mountains into...I couldn't see what.  Was it a waterfall?  There was nothing visible beyond it.  "That's one tall waterfall," I thought.  I knew that's where I was going.  It was unknown.  It might be nowhere, nothing beyond that point but the ultimately peaceful stillness of not being.  It might be a step into another life, another sphere with more learning and relationships.  It might be whatever my consciousness made of it, a place of indescribable beauty and peace or fear and darkness depending on what my mind expected and how much I resisted leaving.  I didn't resist.  I would say I was resigned, but it felt more like humble acceptance and readiness to embark than mere resignation.

I said to my friends, "Sunset.  I've kind of imagined it would feel like this, a slowly setting sun as I depart into the unknown.  I guess it's set up that way to make it more peaceful for me, eh?  You know, some consider nightfall to be a new beginning, a dissolution of the garish light of day...or maybe that was me, too.  Ha, well it feels right."

As I gazed out the window, the din of departing students almost gone now, there were people I wished I could bring with me if I was going somewhere new.  There were relationships I wished had not ended or become strained.  There were people I had wanted to call but didn't because my only explanation would have been, "I'm dying," and I wasn't allowed to let them know that, nor did I want to concern them anyway or somehow obligate niceness or interest, and I certainly didn't want to irritate anyone by calling out of the blue or end on a bad note.  Better to hold on to the good memories and let it be.  We all go through it.  We might've resolved things in time, but I didn't need to.  I was moving on, and it was really, truly OK.  I breathed out slowly as fond or poignant memories of happy moments and personal connections washed over me, and I was that much more ready.

I sat in the window across from the friend who would induce my passage.  There was nothing left to say.  Nothing seemed to matter enough to say it.  Memories from my life kept cycling through my mind as I took in the view and felt my consciousness drifting almost imperceptibly outward over the water in the now-dim light of dusk towards the unknown falls and closed my eyes as if to sleep...

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I woke up and decided to record this while it was fresh, kind of hoping my own eventual death is actually anywhere near so peaceful and that I feel anywhere near so ready if I do somehow know it's coming.  While typing, I suddenly grabbed my sideburn...oh, good, all there.  Earlier in my dream I'd had to cut my own hair and nicked myself in such a way that I was forced to chop off my sideburns way higher than I like, and it was totally goofy-looking.  Right back to caring about the stuff that doesn't matter, eh? *wink*