It could have been because of the pandemic but there I was in the middle of a discussion about the good death. Or perhaps it was because some of those with whom I was arguing are seeing like I do, how near the moment is approaching when the final curtain will be descending. Though we tagged it with the adjective “good”, death as a subject of discourse remains a macabre choice.

There were a few who considered that a good death relates to that of a person who right through to the end continues to fully respect religious practices. Others believed that the good death is one which happens with little pain and without the feeling of too much fear till it is completely over, especially if the process takes some time.

One of us had specialised in the classics and came out with perhaps the best definition of the good death. He told us it was lifted from Solon, a wise Athenian lawyer. Nobody can be counted fortunate before he/she has died; which is what the good death stands for. At this stage, regrettably the discussion degenerated – was it Solon or Sophocles who said so? Personally I doubt whether there can be such a thing as a “good death”.

*** 

THEY’LL GO ON

Virtual meetings will still need to be organized, so it seems. The second wave of the Covid pandemic has arrived before the times that were forecasted for its arrival, and leaves limited margins within which people could meet more frequently face to face. To the contrary, there are those who now predict that restrictions on how work meetings should be held will become even more stringent.

Having gotten used to the routine of virtual meetings, I still do not appreciate so much their interactive dynamics. Apparently, I am not the only one to get this feeling.

Others to whom I have spoken and who can hardly be considered as elderly, express the same dissatisfation with the meetings they follow. Obviously, virtual meetings constitute enormous progress on what would have happened if they were not possible. However, with them the sentiment that decisions are truly being discussed in depth and in the here and now, does tend to become less convincing. 

***

VOTING BY MAIL

In the US, preparations are ongoing for voting in the country’s presidential election to be carried out by mail. President Trump is disliking this option a great deal for it allows more and more voters who do not like him to participate.

He has proposed that less federal funds are allocated to the US postal service, which is already in dire financial straits, so that it will not be able to cope with the demand from voters sending their vote by mail, which would mean that it arrives late.

Such manoeuvres are ugly in and of themselves. Within the US, a superpower, the issue raises controversies which however only have a minimal impact on how political decisions get taken. Just imagine what would happen were the same approaches to be adopted in Maltese politics. From all corners, political forces and NGO’s would be mobilised to proclaim how the island is flouting all the moral and political values embedded in a democracy and needs to change direction, otherwise it will be ostracised.

That’s the difference between what happens to the big and the tiny....