Stingray cartilage

I noticed this in my friends curio collection. He has all sorts of fascinating skeletons, skulls and things like this. But I fell in love with the stingray in particular. 

It looks so alien and odd. But also, in some way, it strongly evokes humanities relationship with the life/ death cycle.

I think that skeletons and similar forms remind us about the fragility of life. Remind us that the chaos of death, decay and rebirth is part of the cycle of existence. An essential part.

It reminded me that someday I will die. 

I wonder if I will leave behind such an elegant, clean pile of bones when I do. 

Stepping towards a new year, I reflected how much death there has been in my sphere throughout this one. Of course there is always this much death, more even. That I am often shielded from it in one way or another. Privilege and other circumstance. Ignorance; both willful and not. Luck.

I decided that one of the things I can take from grief is a sense of gratitude for the astounding beautiful miracle of life and it's precious delicacy. I feel comforted by this.