Robert Silverberg - Going

In the early spring of 2095, with his one hundred thirty-sixth birthday coming on, Henry Staunt decided quite abruptly that the moment had arrived for him to Go. He would notify the Office of Fulfillment, get himself a congenial Guide, take a suite in one of the better Houses of Leavetaking. With the most pleasant season of the year about to unfurl, the timing would be ideal; he could make his farewells and renunciations during these cool green months and get decently out of the way before summer’s blazing eye was open.

This was the first time that he had ever seriously considered Going, and he felt some surprise that the notion had stolen upon him so suddenly. Why, he wondered, was he willing to end it this morning, when he clearly had not been last week, last month, last year? What invisible watershed had he unknowingly crossed, what imperceptible valley of decision? Perhaps this was only a vagrant morning mood; perhaps by noon he would find himself eager to live another hundred years, after all. Eh? No, not likely. He was aware of the resolution, hard and firm, embedded, encapsulated, shining like a glittering pellet at the core of his soul. Arrange for your Going, Henry. Nothing equivocal about that. A tone of certainty. Of finality. Still, he thought, we must not hurry into this. First let me understand my own motives in coming to this decision. The unexamined death is not worth requesting.

He had heard that it was useful, when thoughts of Going first came into one’s mind, to consult that book of Hallam’s—the handbook of dying, the anatomy of world-renunciation. Very well. Staunt touched a bright enameled control stud and the screen opposite the window flowered into color. “Sir?” the library machine asked him.

Staunt said, “Hallam’s book. The one about dying.”

“The Turning of the Wheel: Departure as Consolation, sir?”

“Yes.”

Instantly its title page was on the screen. Staunt picked up the scanning rod and pressed it here and there and there, randomly, bringing this page and that into view. He admired the clarity of the image. The type was bold and elegant, the margins were wide; not for several moments did he begin paying attention to the text.

…essential that the decision, when it is made, be made for the proper reasons. Although sooner or later we must all turn the wheel, abandoning the world to those who await a place in it, nevertheless no one should leave in resentment, thinking that he has been driven too soon from the worldly sphere. It is the task of the civilized man to bring himself, in the fullness of time, to an acceptance of the knowledge that his life has been completed; Going should not be undertaken by anyone who is not wholly ready, and attaining that state of readiness should be our lifelong goal. Too often we delude ourselves into thinking we are truly ready, when actually we have not reached readiness at all, and choose Going out of unworthy or shallow motives. How tragic it is to arrive at the actual moment of Leavetaking and to realize that one has deceived oneself, that one’s motivations are false, that one is, in fact, not in the least ready to Go!

There are many improper reasons for choosing to Go, but they all may be classified as expressions of the desire to escape. One who is experiencing emotional frustration, or difficulty with his work, or a deterioration of health, or intense fatigue, or disappointment of some kind, may, in a moment of dark whim, apply to a House of Leavetaking; but his real intention is a trivial one, that is, to punish the cruel world by escaping from it. One should never look upon Going as a way of getting even. I must point out again that Going is something more than mere suicide. Going is not a petulant, irrational, vindictive deed. It is a positive act, an act of willing renunciation, a deeply moral act; one does not enter into it lightly, solely to escape. One does not say: I loathe you, foul world, therefore I take my leave, and good riddance. One says: I love you, fair world, but I have experienced your joys to the fullest, and now remove myself so that others may know the same joys.

When one first considers Going, therefore, one must strive to discover if one has attained true readiness—that is, the genuine willingness to put aside the world for the sake of others—or if one is simply seeking to satisfy the ego through the gesture of suicide—

There was much more in that vein. He would read it some other time. He turned the screen off.

So. To find the motive for wanting to Go. Walking slowly through the cool, spacious rooms of his old suburban house, Staunt searched for his reasons. His health? Perfect. He was tall, slender, still strong, with his own teeth and a full head of thick, close-cropped white hair. He hadn’t had major surgery since the pancreas transplant nearly seventy years before. Each year he had his arteries retuned, his eyesight adjusted, and his metabolism enhanced, but at his age those were routine things; basically he was a very healthy man. With the right sort of medical care, and everyone nowadays had the right sort of medical care, his body would go on functioning smoothly for decades more.

What then? Emotional problems? Hardly. He had his friends; he had his family; his life had never been more serene than it was now. His work? Well, he rarely worked any longer: some sketches, some outlines for future compositions, but he knew he would never get around to finishing them. No matter. He had only happy thoughts about his work. Worries over the state of the world? No, the world was in fine shape. Rarely finer.

Boredom, perhaps. Perhaps. He had grown weary of his tranquil life, weary of being content, weary of his beautiful surroundings, weary of going through the motions of life. That could be it. He went to the thick clear window of the living room and peered out at the view that had given him so much delight for so many years. The lawn, still pale from winter, sloped evenly and serenely toward the brook, where stubby skunk cabbages clustered. The dogwoods held the first hints of color; the crocuses were not quite finished; the heavy buds of the daffodils would be bursting by Saturday. All was well outside. Lovely. As it always was, this time of year. Yet he was unmoved. It did not sadden him to think that he would probably not see another spring. There’s the heart of it, Staunt thought: I must be ripe for Going, because I don’t care to stay. It’s that simple. I’ve done all I care to do, I’ve seen all I care to see; now I might just as well move along. The wheel has to turn. Others are waiting to fill my place. It is a far, far better thing I do, et cetera, et cetera.

“Get me the Office of Fulfillment,” he told his telephone.

A gentle female face appeared on the small screen.

Staunt smiled. “My name’s Henry Staunt, and I think I’m ready to Go. Would you send a Guide over as soon as you can?”

An hour later, as Staunt stood by the studio window listening to one of his favorites among his own compositions, the string quartet of 2038, a green-blue copter descended and came fluttering to a halt on his lawn, resting on a cushion of air a short distance above the tips of the grass. It bore on its hull the symbol of the Office of Fulfillment—a wheel and a set of enmeshed gears. The hatch of the copter lifted and, to Staunt’s surprise, Martin Bollinger got out. Bollinger was a neighbor, a friend of long standing, possibly the closest friend Staunt had these days; he often came over for visits; lately there had been some talk of Staunt’s setting a group of Bollinger’s poems to music; but what was Bollinger doing riding around in a Fulfillment Office copter?

Jauntily Bollinger approached the house. He was short, compact, buoyant, with sparkling brown eyes and soft, wavy hair. Staunt supposed he must be seventy or so, eighty at most. Still a young man. Prime of life. It made Staunt feel youthful just to have Bollinger around, and yet he knew that to Bollinger, Bollinger was no youngster. Staunt hadn’t felt like a boy when he was eighty, either. But living to one hundred thirty-six changes your perspective about what’s old.