I wrote this after watching How to Train Your Dragon and having an existential crisis… so this is what you get!

I’d rather die fighting a dragon than anything else. Well, I’d also be okay with dying to some other mythological creature, my personal favorite creature is a hydra, but if Cerberus or a minotaur killed me, that’d be cool too. If I die from a car crash, it’s tragic but shows the morality of man, and their willingness to get into, what my dad called automobiles when he was teaching me to drive, “speeding metal death traps.” If I died from old age, I’d have lived a long, potentially fulfilling life, but I’d fear the uncertainty of how or when I would pass. What if I died without saying I love you to my family one last time?

I’m not old, so the idea of death is still foreign to me and difficult to think about. It’s impossible to think about the end when you’re still at the beginning, and that’s why I want to die fighting a dragon. If I catch fire and burn to death, then I’m a valiant warrior and heroic person. If it bites my head off because I didn’t dive out of the way, then maybe I gave it enough food to protect a nearby village from its treachery for another day. If I tried to ride it, pretending like I’m a cartoon in a kid’s book, then I’d fall to my death as the most daring man who’s ever lived.

Dragons are fucking cool, and no matter how big and dangerous they are, dying to a dragon is awesome, and you would feel like a god. I’d be the guy who attacked a dragon and lost, but I’d be the guy who attacked a dragon. Instead of the failure that I’ve become today, I’d be a dragon warrior tomorrow. I wouldn’t regret all of the things I haven’t been able to do, but instead, I’d be remembered as the guy who failed to kill a dragon.

I’d rather be someone who failed at something amazing, then the guy who died in some other meaningless way. I could save a baby from the hands of a dangerous wizard but get killed by a lightning bolt. I could cut the first six heads of a hydra off but have the seventh take me down. I could even get so close to medusa that she turns to stone because of the reflection off of my eyes as they turn to stone too.

I just don’t want to go in some way that makes me easily forgettable. I want to meet my grandkids and live long enough to see show my parents that I’m successful, even against the most terrible odds. I would like to see my siblings all be as happy as they can be with people that fulfill their every need. I want this dragon to eat me, so that I don’t have to be disappointed when I fail on everything that I’ve set my heart to.