When I was nineteen years old, my family traveled to California to attend my cousin’s wedding. We made a vacation out of the trip, driving the Pacific Coast Highway and visited various attractions. One of those attractions was a casino in Reno, Nevada.

I was shocked to see the lobby of the casino filled with children. Their parents were gambling, and they were left to wait. I’m sure that doesn’t happen anymore. My cousin, Karen and I, both college students on summer break, either didn’t have the money to gamble or weren’t old enough, so we ended up seeing a movie, at a theater, inside the casino.

To make an already strange situation even more weird, the movie was Harold & Maude. It’s a cult classic about a teenager and his relationship with a much older woman and their shared obsession with death.

While not to their extreme, I did think, ‘I have found my people” — people like me, who were consumed with thoughts of life and death, why are we here and what happens after we die. As you can imagine, I’m a popular party guest.

Memories of Harold & Maude and my existential brooding were triggered last week with the news story of the titanic submergible. Two scenarios ran through my brain. The very best scenario was a quick death from an explosion, which I understand is what they believe happened.

The second scenario is my worst nightmare, despite making great efforts to come to peace with it. What if they were alive but certain they were going to die? What if they had to contemplate their own deaths?

Even though we all are going to die, most of us keep that thought well out of mind. But when you’re told you are terminal or you are sinking in the ocean with no power, it becomes the central movie playing in your brain. How does one bear that?

I have often wondered if it is better to have hope. Hope sounds good.  Hope can be cruel. I remember, in 2010 I had two friends going through cancer treatment. Both of them had very serious cases.

In my prayer journal, I always prayed for them and added a caveat. “God, what if my prayers aren’t answered? What if you take them despite so many people praying they are cured? What does that mean? Are you cruel? Do you not care? Is it true what my friend Pilar says, that “we are each stamped with our expiration date the day we were born?” Is this their time?

Then I remembered Karen from my bible study. After intensely grieving her mother’s death, she realized, “God doesn’t see death as a punishment.” If you believe death marks your return to God, its understandable God would want to reassure us that we will be just fine in death. It’s like returning to a favorite grandparent’s home.

Still, in my prayers, I assure God all of my loved ones are probably best left right here, with me.

Being lost underwater, in the dark with no communication is a terror none of us wants to imagine, and yet, the news reports have started that movie rolling in our minds. My chest tightens just thinking about the range of emotions I would experience.

Thoughts of an imminent demise always lead me to my core struggle: if I knew I had six months to live, would I spend today any differently? And if I would, how so? And in answering that question, am I telling myself what I need to change in my life?

Most of us can’t just leave our job and head to the islands, but what would we do differently? What is like living on that razor’s edge between life and death? I ask that, as all of us sit there, not knowing when we will tip to the other side. We like to think the tipping point is years — maybe decades away. We believe our razor’s edge is broad as the Kansas plains.

There is one thing I believe I’d change if I was in that precarious position and living my last months, weeks and days. I know the bravery to say a sincere “I love you” would come.

I always want to be that courageous person who looks my friends and extended family right in the eye and says, “I love you.” What if I died and they didn’t know? Is that worse than the incredible discomfort of actually saying it?

I can say, “love ya!” My friend, Lori always says, “love ya, mean it.” I say it right back. Could I say, “Lori, I love you”? Oh my gosh, my face just contorted at the discomfort of even thinking of saying it. A high school friend, Craig, shared a story on Facebook once, about how he was placing an order at KFC and the cashier said, “I love you.” My friend said it changed him forever. I think about his story often.

My parents didn’t say “I love you.” One time each they said, “I love ya,” and it was as I was walking away. I say “I love you” to my husband and sons 427,000 times each year. With children, it helps to start young. When they are little, they kind of have to say it back.

My favorite part of every yoga class is the end. It is called shavasana. It’s also called “corpse pose.” My most beloved yoga teacher ever, Micha, said it is a “chance to practice death,” which of course, given my obsession, I loved.

You lie on your mat and first get all the jiggles out of your body, and find stillness. Then, you try to relax. When I first began practicing yoga, my mind would race during shavasana, with things I had to do, and thoughts of, ‘when is this going to be finished so I can leave?’ After Micha told us it was practicing death, I was all in.

Now, I lie there, and if my brain can’t quiet, I am brave in my thoughts. I say, to anyone who enters my mind, and I mean anyone –it could be a close relative, the mailman or the person who cut me off on the way to yoga:

May you have love

May you have peace

May you have joy

May you have health

May you have safety

It’s called either Metta or “loving kindness” meditation. I lie there with these very sincere thoughts, wishing well-being on friends, family members and even strangers. It’s all done in the secret of my mind and often fills me with emotion.

What if that’s what the end is like? What if we are filled with emotion, with love, with sincere wishes for everyone’ s well-being? God, I hope so.