What if the scariest thing about living is not death?
Words Rica Mae Labbao
Art by Kirk Bertrand
November 4, 2026
Art by Kirk Bertrand
Every year, walking onto a series of lined up tombs and mausoleums has been a tradition. Remembering those who already departed, but never really left our hearts. But what if those who try to remember also leave, who will continue the memories of those who passed?
This year, not every grave is visited. Some already grew unwanted weeds all over it, there are those who got wrecked through the years, and those who got exhumed because no one really cared for it over a long time. It’s saddening to see how a once loved person can become a forgotten memory.
Death is scary
Living means finding peace before death, but it can also mean that death is something nobody can ever be prepared for. That’s why the saying “live your best life” is a nice quote about life because at the end of their time, everyone will eventually die.
Yet it is still okay to find death as scary as it is, because you’ll never know when the time comes. What if you die without reaching your dreams? What if you die a tragic death? What if you die with regrets? What’s gonna happen then?
No one knows. So it is scary. Because death could knock at your door anytime even if you are not prepared to face it.
Death means leaving
Dying is leaving everything behind. Your things. Your friends. Your loved ones. Your life. Everything. It means you will go without all the things you ever had.
Art by Kirk Bertrand
The career you’ve worked so hard for. The friends and connections you treasured. The people you loved and cared for. The life you’ve always chosen to live every single day through ups and downs. You’ll leave these things behind.
Death is scary because it makes you abandon everything that keeps you going. It forces you to depart without having all that you’ve ever loved.
Death is accompanied by grief
As dying makes you leave, it allows grief to seep between every meaningful connection you have. Grief follows death but it remains forever stuck to the people who loved you in every form.
In a picture you’re smiling so wide. In a silly routine you always do. In your favorite sweet donut treat. In the clothes you’ve always liked. Your favorite color, place, and things. You’re always there because grieving your death is missing you in every simple thing that reminds them of you.
Grief doesn’t go away even if acceptance is already fulfilled, because death doesn’t really sit well with every person who loved you enough to wish you were still there.
Death means you’re not there anymore
When you die, you are not present anymore. Slowly, the people you love will start to move forward and accept your passing.
They will stop thinking about you, celebrating your birthday, finding things that remind them of you, and eventually learning to live without you. Because you already left, death made you.
As time passes by, things will change and people go on with their lives. That’s normal and exactly what everyone hopes for, but since you’re not physically there, you’re not a part of their lives anymore. Slowly, people will forget until no one remembers you at all.
The scariest thing
As you wither, you wish for everyone to continue living the way they used to be, but death is as cruel as it is.
Art by Kirk Bertrand
Your memories will continue to live on for as long as the people who remember still live. But as they grow and find their ways in life, the memories can go somewhere unvisited.
Untold. Unspoken. Unpassed.
So yes, maybe dying isn’t really the scariest thing but being forgotten is. Being washed away from the memories of the people who treasured you. That once in this world, someone like you existed. Someone who lived a life worth remembering.
In between shadows of dying, grief, and leaving, we all fear being forgotten. Not because it’s a selfish thought, but a worry that creeps in deeper than the pain of death.
As much as we never want to forget a departed loved one, it’s also that much that they wish for us to not forget them. In between rows of lonely, uncared for tombs, I find something scarier than death itself. A realization that someday, no one will remember you anymore.
