Death by and on itself is indifferent, boring, you can't really do something about it, it's a blank, mute, void transaction. Old age though is a different beast. The greatest ailment of our conscious lives boils down to this:
There is (usually) no dignity in ageing
Society will warmingly wrap a drooling baby around the comfort blanket of appreciation and will do the exact opposite for the same drooling baby once transmigrated into a drooling senile adult.
Good post! You seem to have an affinity towards Castaneda. How does he fare in your books?
Well, Castaneda certainly would not agree with you that death is "indifferent, boring", certainly not for a "warrior".
And I have faced my death many times, sometimes in ceremonies similar to what Castaneda wrote about. I can confirm that it is anything but boring :-)
Castaneda is adept in talking about the "passage after". Our understanding of death, out of the context of a "psychedelic" experience, is hardly an imaginative affair. What we colloquially understand when using the term "death" is the final moments in the gradual deterioration of a living organism up to its point of expiration. The actual "passing" is merely a phase shift, a flicking of a switch. I am referring to this widely observable bit of the process. I call it "boring" because no matter how it transpires it will still culminate into the inevitable. What lies beyond, if any, may indeed not be boring. For now i will take yours and Castaneda's word for it. :)
That's because society doesn't see any value in a old person. But old people can still ad value to the world. Most important would be their families/friend/caregivers still value them high?
Obviously.