"One Life, Live It"

About eight months ago, a 20-year-old woman, Nicole Morgan, from Derbyshire, England, was diagnosed with metastatic epithelioid sarcoma. She died in late February. Her obituary from her small local paper is here. L. pointed this piece out to me. We were both struck by Nicole's willfulness, defiance and bravery.

Her motto had always been "one life, live it", a philosophy she strongly believed in.

And a few weeks before she died, she defied her parents and doctors by having the words tattooed on to her wrist.

Mum Tracey said: "We told her not to go because the doctors had said her platelet count was low but she told us that if we didn't take her she would just take a taxi and get it done anyway."

About 15 family members and friends also got similar tattoos. She was a favorite fan of the local rugby club. She asked for her coffin to be driven to the church in a white hearse pulled by two white horses. Horses! She was so young! But a ghastly attraction for youth, unfortunately, is one of sarcoma's many horrors.

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I can't help imagining this: If after death we rise up as spirits and wait to be judged, on arrival would Nicole draw back her cooling tattooed wrist and cuff whatever she found there?