My name is Katherine. most of you would forebode me a spook, or perhaps an angel. I am you see, what nearly mortals call `` absolutely ''. In fact, today is my funeral. I had n't really planned on dying. I 'm only 21 years old. I had just returned from the natural spring formal dance. I had barely entered the door of the sorority house when I started feeling ill. My head started throbbing. The room started to whirlpool as I collapsed and everything went black.

I woke up lying on my back. I was on a board in a brightly lit room. respective men and women in hospital uniforms were putting away equipment and collecting spent supplies. In spite of the hopeful light, the room seemed to be filled with an ethereal mist. The citizenry all seemed to be moving in a dumb, corpse, almost phantasmagoric mode. They all seemed to be ignoring me.

I sat up, climbed off the table, and followed one of the doctors ( I assumed they were doctors ) out of the elbow room through a set of double door. I do n't really sleep together why I did this. It just seemed the thing to do. Somehow I felt that there was an answer waiting for me if I followed.

The doctor lead down a corridor, then through another door into a small waiting room. My mother and father were the but one in the room.

I rushed ahead of the doctor, `` Mom ! Dad ! `` I rushed ahead to greet them, overjoyed to see familiar faces. `` What are you doing here ? What 's happened ? Where are we ? ``

They looked right through me as if I was n't even there. Instead, they turned to the doctor. The face on their faces was one of anxiousness and fear.

Without waiting for the doubt that was written on their faces, the Dr. spoke.

'' Mr. and Mrs. Johnson ? Please sit down. Your girl suffered a major intellectual aneurisim. In layman 's price, a weak section in one of the John Major arteries in her brain swelled and burst. There was naught we could do. Your daughter is dead. ``

At those Logos my mother went white, then collapsed, sobbing, on my beginner, who simply stared blankly, disbelievingly, into space.

My first thinking were `` What kind of bad joke is this ? '' `` Why are you telling my parents I 'm all in when I am obviously standing right in front of them plain as the olfactory organ on your face ? ``

After a few min, my mother composed herself enough to speak. `` I want to see her. I want to see my baby ''

'' Certainly '' said the doctor `` If you feel you are up to it, I will get you to her. ``

My parents rose slowly and with a stiff, robot like walking followed the doc back through the two-bagger threshold and down the Charles Francis Hall from which I had just minute before emerged. They turned into a room marked `` exigency ICU - A ''

I recognized the elbow room as the one from which I had emerged into the vestibule when I had first followed the MD. The room was vacant of medical checkup stave now. The equipment had all been removed or neatly stored against the walls.

In the mall of the room, under a bright overhead light, was a table on which lay a female human body, covered with a melt off whiten sheet. I began to have a very sick notion in the pit of my stomach. For the first of all fourth dimension the thought entered my mind that maybe this was no joke.

But it had to be. How could I be lying there covered with a sheet and standing here watching at the same sentence ? It must be a misapprehension. They will displume down the sheet and it will be someone else. It had to be someone else !

My parents followed the doctor, hesitatingly, to the table. Gently, the doctor folded down the sheet.

There I was. I was standing here, but I was also lying on the tabular array. The me on the table was still dressed in the garden pink satin dress I had worn to the dancing. I looked to be asleep. My mind raced, grasping for any fragment of promise. I had read about out-of-body experiences. How someone near death felt themselves leave their own body. Usually there was a voice telling them to go back because they had more to do with their life. I was only twenty-one. I certainly had more to do. I had almost a whole aliveness ahead. I was just getting started. I do n't hear any voice. But that does n't matter. I just lie back down on the table, fuse back into my trunk and wake up. The doctor will be dumbfounded. Mom and dad will be overjoyed. I 'll expend a few twenty-four hour period in the hospital and go on with my life.

I did n't really think about how one climbs back into single own organic structure. I just went over to the table and lay down. I closed my centre and placed my arms in the Sami place as the ego on the table. I opened my eyes expecting to see the surprise face. But dad just continued to stare disbelievingly. Mom was stroking my hairsbreadth and sob, just as before.

Finally they turned away and the doctor covered my side with the sheet.

'' No '' I screamed, `` I 'm not beat '' I flailed by arms, kicked my legs and screamed again. But all my attempt went ignored. What ever I was now, I was invisible and inaudible to the mankind I knew. I really was dead.

By the time of my wake I had still not fully accepted the mind of being dead. The funeral home sent a car for mom and dad. I really did n't like the mentation of being on display, but I was rummy to see what they had done with me.

A crowd had already gathered when we arrived. I followed my parents into the home, passing through the crowd unnoticed. The room where I lay was filled with flowers. My casket lay on a low table. It was glowing shining white with gold handles and passementerie. The lid was open.

I hesitated once again. I knew that what I would see would only add to the weight of a realism I did not yet want to accept. I also knew I had to wait. Slowly, I stepped up to the casket.

I gazed at the dream-like scene before me. The former me, the me that lay in the casket, was dressed as for her hymeneals. Mom had promised me her bridal surgical gown for my marriage ceremony. Instead, she had given it to me for my burial. A white head covering covered my typeface like a fine mist. A large redolence of calla lilies lay in my arms.

As I stared at the jewel casket, I began to sharpen on the peaceful face, my face, beneath the caul. My orbit of visual sense seemed to narrow, as if, without taking a footmark, I was moving closer and closer to the look within the jewel casket. Suddenly, I was no longer standing before the casket, but lying inside ; looking up through the misty head covering that covered my face. I felt the sang-froid satin of my wedding dress turned burial scrubs. I smelled the bouquet of the lilies.

I sensed the side of my jewel casket close all around. I remembered seeing a horror movie once about a adult female being locked into a coffin by some maniac. The prototype was of a casket as a prison, locking her inside. But now that did n't appear right at all. I felt as if I was in a safe, warm bed ; not a prison house, but instead a utter shelter from the world.

I became aware of people passing by. Some paused but a moment then went on. Others stood or kneeled before the casket, seemingly lost in their opinion. I could hear whispered prayers. While I could not understand the Logos somehow I knew the speech were unimportant. The love life they represented seemed to take form as a shimmering brightness level that grew in intensity with each offered orison. I felt wave upon wave of the sang-froid silver luminosity surrounding me, flowing over me, filling me. I felt as if I was losing myself, willingly, in the overpowering radiance. I felt both a growing elation and a sentiency of total peacefulness slap-up than anything I had known. I felt myself floating, flying, lifted ever higher, deeper into the light.

Then all went black. I felt as if a tidy sum had crushed down on my mortal. I opened my eyes and the light was gone. I was standing in the trial room of the funeral habitation. All my friends and family were gone. The funeral manager was fastening the latches on my now closed casket.

This aurora I rode in the hearse as they carried me to church. I watched as they placed my coffin on the bier at the front and placed the flowers all around. All the Guest have arrived. The church is packed. I never realized how many the great unwashed cared about me.

The serve is just beginning but already I see a shaft of the ethereal Light Within surrounding my casket. It is already hard and brighter than at my Wake Island. I suppose that is because everyone is praying together. I know that all I have to do is step into the light and giving up to it and I will be swept away to somewhere wonderful beyond imagining.

I know what will happen here. In a petty while the service will be over. They will carry me, that early me in the casket, back to the hearse. They will force back me to the memorial park, say a few appropriate words, and then they will lour me into the grave that even now is open and waiting.

If I stay I fear the blackness will hail crashing down as they shovel the terra firma over me. I feel the light reaching out. I sense its peace. Its time for me to go .