Death.

You can cover the floors with plastic wood paneling, you can paint the walls bright colors, you can hang up photographs and paintings of sunrises and plants, but hospitals still smell like death.

I am incredibly depressing. I almost put this as my facebook status, but thought against it. Just a little too dark for the facebook community.

I haven't slept at all this week.
My grandpa has been in the hospital due to kidney failure since Wednesday.
He is getting an artificial kidney. An artificial, extrinsic kidney.
Cold. Hard. Plastic.
Attached to the outside of his body, to keep him alive.
He will have this for the rest of his life.
He has to change it every three weeks.
Cold. Hard. Plastic.
I haven't slept at all this week but I'm not sure the two events are related. Something about this week has been unnaturally awful. Failed interviews, threatened detentions, unpredictable futures, unpredictable lives. It's enough to lose sleep over.

Today I visited the hospital. And the only thing I could think of was my aunt. I really hate hospitals. Who doesn't? Everything is shoved inside this giant institution, covered by this veneer of cheerfulness. It feels like I'm walking into an airport until I get a whiff of the air. Until I listen to the noises and the announcements. Beeping moniters, whirring breathing machines, the Sunday news in the background, painfully light small talk with your family, painfully sensitive small talk with your family. Nobody wants to talk about your condition. Nobody wants to mention the word "death". Everybody is always tired. I hate hospitals.

I hate seeing people so useless. So incapable. Tangled up in plastic, the wires and the machines are no longer an extension of the patient, but the patient is an extension of them. Parasitic in nature, feeding on it to cling onto dear life. Dear life.

And what am I supposed to say? What could I possibly say?
Hey Grandpa, try your best not to die. I'll see you tomorrow. I'll see you tonight. I got into college. Hey Grandpa, feel better. Get well soon. Smile. I love you?
Are you hot? Are you cold? Did you eat? How's the food? Did you sleep? How did you sleep? Should I turn on the television? Should I open a window?
Do you need anything?
What could you possibly need that I could possibly provide for you?

I've only been to one funeral in my entire life and it wasn't even for someone I knew. It wasn't even for my aunt. It was for some random acquaintance of my mom's. It was held in a small funeral home with sterile white stucco walls and wine red almost shag carpet. There were lots of doors and rooms. People were either making too much noise or not enough. It was eerie.
I spent a lot of time in the bathroom.
I cried for this woman I never knew, never heard of, never seen.

How are we supposed to deal with death? People don't die. I'm a teenager. I'm invincible. Didn't you know that? Isn't that common knowledge? Nothing can touch me or the people around me. People don't die.

I'm not sad right now. My grandpa is better. His "condition" is stabilizing. I'm not sad. I'm indifferent. I'm uncomfortable. I'm not feeling much of anything.

I am as empty as a grave full of dust.

When I die--if I die--I want to be ready. If not willing, then at ease. Am I asking too much?