This isn’t the first piece I’ve written about grief and maybe there is a lot more coming..
They say your life flashes before your eyes right before you die. Some claim it takes seven minutes. But I think it’s more like seven seconds.
Because seven minutes feels too generous. Death is not known for being generous. Seven seconds is more believable. Seven seconds is brutal, fast, unfair. Like a phone call in the middle of a good day. Like a knock on your door that ends your version of normal. Like waking up and realizing someone is gone and nothing in the room looks different, but everything is.
When you're a kid, you hear the word "passed away" or "meninggal" and you think it's something reserved for old people with canes or great-grandparents who live in a different province or your parents hometown. But then you hit your 30s, and suddenly it's not distant anymore. It's your school friend. Your favorite uncle. Your neighbor. The abang-abang who used to sell bubur ayam on his bike. It's your cat. Your in-laws. Your mom or dad, maybe.
And no one told you about this part. That grief would become this constant, shifting backdrop. That losing people wouldn’t be an event, but a pattern.
So.., the flashes they're talking about, a flash of smell and sound and regret. The taste of that birthday cake you pretended to like. Your dad's laugh. That time you said something cruel in 2012 and never apologized. A flash of your wedding day. A fight about laundry. Your favorite radio announcer on your way to work. The look in your cat's eyes the morning you knew he was in pain. That one time you danced in your kitchen for no reason. The sound of your mom's voice when she said, "lose some weight!"
That’s all you get. Seven seconds. A stuttered, emotional zip file.
And I think what terrifies me the most is that I'm already starting to live like I’m sorting through the footage. Not because I’m dying. But because so many around me already have. Or are.
You lose enough people and suddenly every mundane thing gets heavy. Your mom complaining about your sister becomes sacred. A friend texting you "kabarin ya kalau udah sampai" feels like a blessing. You start screenshotting messages. Saving voicemails. Hoarding photos that are barely in focus. You start noticing what you never captured. You wonder if you’re doing enough to remember them while they’re still here. Or if you’ll look back and realize you missed too much, too distracted, too busy pretending we have time.
You don’t want to admit it, but part of you is already preparing.
And some mornings, I catch myself wondering: if I only had seven seconds, would I spend the first two apologizing? Would I waste one second begging for more time? Would I get to the good parts? Would I even remember them?
Sometimes I think I’m not afraid of death. I'm afraid of missing the beauty while it's still happening. I'm afraid my last memory would be of a spreadsheet or a petty fight. I'm afraid of not being present enough to hold the things I know I'll one day ache to remember. And that’s the part I still struggle to live with—how easy it is to forget life while you’re busy surviving it.
Grief has rewired my brain. Therapy helps me name it, but it doesn’t make it gentler. I still brace for impact when the phone rings. I still whisper "please not now" when someone I love is late to reply.
And it’s lonely, this grief. Not because I don’t have people. But because I can’t unknow how fragile they are. How fragile I am.
I used to think growing older meant building things: careers, families, homes, routines. But I think it also means slowly, painfully, learning how to let go-even to my husband. How to carry both grief and groceries. How to keep living while knowing more goodbyes are coming.
Because that’s the truth I’m starting to carry: from now on, I will only lose more people I knew and grew up with. The elders I adore will go first. Then eventually, death will take its turn on me—maybe a little earlier than I expected. I don’t know when. I just know it’s coming. And I want to be ready, but I never really will be.
Maybe that’s the real point of the seven seconds.
Not a review. Not a punishment. But a mercy. A soft, messy, flawed reminder that we lived. That we loved. That we were here long enough to have something to lose.
If I only get seven seconds, I hope it starts with my mother’s voice. Ends with my husband’s laugh. And somewhere in the middle, a blurry memory of Georgie & Pepito curling up on my chest like he owned the place.
Because he did. They all did.
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