Now you should know i am not a medical kind of guy. This was a realization i suffered when i thought i was capable of  doing anything in the world i wished to do.

It was my freshman year at Vanderbilt, the spring semester 1962. Engineering required me to take Chemistry 101 and then 102. i had made a “D” my first semester. i wasn’t doing much better that spring semester. Perhaps this might have been a product of not picking up my chemistry book for two weeks, then pulling an all night cramming session on Thursdays before the regular two-week test on Friday. You see, i really did think i could do anything, like not studying and passing an extremely tough college course in chemistry.

But even after the first semester grade and carrying a high “D” at the end of the semester, i went into the final exam with great expectations (i have always been and remain an optimist).

i scored in  the 50’s. Bad. But Chemistry 101 and 102 were weed-out courses for all of the folks who matriculated to Vandy with the goal of scoring well in the pre-med regimen with aspirations of being accepted for Vandy’s medical school, one of the best in the country . It was tough. It was doubly tough for my class of 100 or so who got the professor from Russia whom i could not understand and consequently slept through his dramatic lectures filling about thirty feet of black board behind him with chemical notations i also did not understand, perhaps abetted by previously mentioned time, or lack thereof, with my nose in the chemistry books and not yet mentioned proclivity to nap during the lectures because of drinking beer the night before.

Regardless, i scored in the 50’s. But looking at all of the other scores and knowing the professor graded on the curve, i actually believed i might pull out a “C” on the exam. i was on cloud nine, an optimistic cloud nine, but still cloud nine.

But then there was Andy Berry. Andy was in my graduating class in Lebanon. He graduated from Lebanon High School and i graduated from Castle Heights. He is a good guy. i like Andy a lot except for that semester in chemistry. Andy scored 97 on the final exam. His grade completely screwed up the curve. Consequently, i got a “D” on the exam and a “D”in the course on my way to an infamous exit from Vandy the next year.

So you are correct: i’m not a medical or science expert.

But i am a good observer, and i have been observing a lot of stuff for a lot of years, three-quarters of a century actually.

Through those observations, i recently stumbled upon a medical science phenomenon overlooked by the most brilliant medical and science experts.

i have discovered, through blurry observation, the primary, never-to-be-argued, undeniable reason for dying.

Are you ready for this?

Everyone, and i mean everyone, dies because of…

living.

Simply put: If you live you die; if you don’t live, you don’t die.

i think there is an important aspect in that revelation. But i also know each of you will  have your own idea about what that aspect is for you. For me, it means i should live, if it is the reason i’m gonna die, to the fullest everyday…and not sweat the small stuff.

Medical science: eat your heart out.