Immortality at Midnight - The New York Times

"There I am, then, my body seeded with cancer that has recurred and may return, whereas now the air is sweet and quiet, with only me conscious, and I can inch forward into futures I weave for the ones I must leave behind. May they prosper and thrive through a series of tomorrows I will not experience but cherish envisioning. For they need to find — oh, please let them find! — love elsewhere and abundantly. Yes, here I am, not the object of concern or pity that I will become later again, as before. But at this hour — because of a shivering or a silvering — alight with the frisson of being unknown in the night’s oasis, hugging my captivated self so as to capture a sliver of exhilaration and bring back a swatch for those circumstances when I will need to remember what it was all for. "

Immortality at Midnight - The New York Times