“In My Time of Dying: How I Came Face-to-Face with the Idea of An Afterlife” by Sebastian Junger
c.2024 / Simon & Schuster / $27.99 / 163 pages
Breathe in. Breathe out.
You’ve been doing it since the moment you were born and you don’t even have to think about it. You can hold in air, blow out candles, pant like a puppy, and calm yourself with a little lung-power, then go back to ignoring the whole system. It’s amazing but, as in the new book “In My Time of Dying” by Sebastian Junger, it’s also a terrifyingly fragile thing.
The pain in his abdomen, just below his sternum, waxed and waned over the course of months.
Like many people, Sebastian Junger made note of it, shook it off, and resumed his life. He was a husband, father, writer, journalist and filmmaker. He had things to do, starting with a chore he’d been procrastinating on: clearing heavy brush along the sides of his driveway.
In retrospect, he says, it’s odd that he’d tackle the chore on that day. The day he passed out, the day his wife had to half-carry him home, she called an ambulance, he went to the hospital, bleeding out through a ruptured aorta below his sternum.
That day, Junger almost died.
He was unconscious during some of what happened next, as doctors worked to save his life against rock-bottom odds. He lost track of time and space in the ER, but one thing Junger recalls with clarity: his father — dead well more than a decade — beckoned Junger to enter a black hole to the left of Junger’s bed.
Junger’s father had been a scientist, brilliant, focused, and non-religious, and he passed that attitude to his son, who’d seen his share of war and death. Junger hadn’t thought much about near-death experiences (NDEs) or an afterlife, but this was different. In the vast (but inadequate) research, this was his father, and his death.
But he didn’t die. He lived, with questions.
“Finding yourself alive after almost dying is not, as it turns out, the kind of party one might expect. You realize that you weren’t returned to life, you were just introduced to death.
“Would I ever function normally again?”
You may think you’ve made up your mind: there’s an afterlife, or there’s not. Or maybe you’re undecided. Author Sebastian Junger is about to upset whatever opinion, or at least just scuff it up a bit, because “In My Time of Dying” opens a wide discussion.
First, though, you need to get past a lot of history — of war, ancient beliefs and biology — plus memoir, heavy on science and medicine. This can be dull, but it’s necessary so readers can fully understand the monumentality of what happened to Junger, and his semi-skeptical urge to learn more. He offers readers a window into his thoughts, at that point: He knew science. He knew life. He knew death. Is there an intersection with the three?
Be prepared to be awed, and maybe a little frightened. Be ready to have your own thoughts on life after death poked and prodded — and maybe changed. Beware for “In My Time of Dying” to leave you breathless.
By TERRI SCHLICHENMEYER
The Bookworm Sez
