Renewal

I renewed my Driver's License.  I didn't get a new picture.  That was a mistake.  I have the same picture from my Learner's Permit.  It looks like a much younger, much whiter, much chunkier version of who I am today.  I sometimes wonder why people accept that it's me when I get ID'd.  Then I panic and wonder if I actually still look like that.  I don't think I do.  Maybe my mirrors are wrong.

I also checked the box for organ donation.  When my new license arrived, I saw that it has a small, bright red heart on the front of it.  On the positive side, it distracts from the deformed picture.  On the negative side....

I also got a letter from the New York State Department of Health.  It thanks me for making the life saving decision to register.  I have officially consented to giving away my organs (and tissues and eyes, oh my).

So, of course, I'm now in a different state of panic.  I waved the letter in front of Eddie when he came home from work: They're going to harvest my organs! They're going to kidnap me, kill me, and harvest my organs!

Eddie's response: I told you not to check the box.

Then my brother visits yesterday.  First, he laughs at my license while I'm showing him the bright red heart and says, What, were you hung over in that picture?  Um, no, thanks, and that's not the point.

Then he says: They won't kill you.  You'll just wake up in a bathtub of ice with your liver missing.

Thank you.  Thank you, both.

So today I see that the letter says I can fill out a specification form from their website and send it in so that they use my organs (and tissues and eyes, oh my) the way I want them to.  I read the form.  You can check off all kinds of boxes--use my kidneys but not my skin; use it for research but not for transplants.

Then I felt ridiculous.  And kind of like a dick.  If I'm going to donate my organs (and tissues and eyes, oh my), I really shouldn't be in the business of being picky.  I mean, come on.  I'm obviously avoiding the major issue here--if I'm donating my organs, I'm in a position for which I no longer need them, ie not among the living, so I need to not pick and choose who gets what.  Instead, I need to look at it from a narcisisstic viewpoint--I can save a life.  I'll let them take whatever they need, as long as they don't kill me to get it.  I can live with that.  (Did you hear me?  Live!  I want to live!).

Moral of the story: I've watched to many movies about organ harvesting than I realized.  Actually, I don't know if I've watched even one, but however it got into my head, I've dwelled on that a bit too much.