Death comes for us all, as the English martyr Sir Thomas More reminded his accusers in the play "A Man for All Seasons." The line echoed poignantly in the mind late last month when death finally came for Elisabeth Kuebler-Ross, the remarkable Swiss-born psychiatrist who had done as much as anyone to take the chill off such thoughts.
We all meet death in different ways, according to our faith, culture, temperament and the particular circumstances in which we depart. We also react differently to the deaths of those we love or revere (or loathe, for that matter), mostly according to what we believe "happens" to them in the hereafter. But it is safe to say that millions of people meet death more calmly, and millions more endure bereavement better, because of Kuebler-Ross's pioneering work in this grim field.
The point was that the feisty, funny psychiatrist did not see it as grim at all. "Dying," she once famously said, "is nothing to fear. It can be the most wonderful experience of your life."