Dancing with Death

Growing up, I built Day of the Dead altars every year as part of our school's cultural activities. I remember carefully arranging marigolds, sugar skulls, and photos, treating death as something colorful and celebratory. Back then, it felt like a fun art project. Now, as an adult, I find myself wondering. Why do we humans swing so wildly between celebrating death and being paralyzed by it?

In my teens, death was abstract. Something to be decorated with papel picado and pan de muerto. But the first time I truly faced mortality, when I really thought about it, the realization hit me: one day, everything I am would just... stop. No amount of festive skulls could ease that primal fear. The truth is, we're afraid. Not just of our own death, but of the devastating silence left by those who leave us.

Yet here we are, turning death into Halloween parties and true crime podcasts, while simultaneously being unable to sleep when we really think about our own mortality. This duality fascinates me. How we can laugh at skeleton decorations one moment and be gripped by existential dread the next.