Spontaneous human combustion!!!

When I was younger I was scared to death that of spontaneous human combustion. The thought that there was a possibility that I could be somewhere cold chilling,minding my business and just burst into flames without warning scared the shit out of me. (I was also scared of that one nigh ball lightning would float through one of the walls of my house and chase me down like some heat seeking missile and electrocute me till I died.) I don't know maybe I watched to much unsolved mysteries but these were real legitimate fears to me when I was younger. It wasn't until middle school when did some research and found out that spontaneous combustion most likely didn't even really exist that I was able to stop worrying about it. What a relief that was, it was like a great big weight was surgically removed from the inside of my head. Now fast forward to present day. I'm walking to my car getting ready to leave my house and my neighbor who I love so dearly stops me and ask me if I could do her a favor. Oh course I would. She told me her husband was recently diagnosed with cancer and she had been talking him to the doctor everyday for treatment but it's going to be difficult for her to take him on Wednesdays because of some classes she was taking and asked if I could take him for her. I knew he had cancer because my mom had told me this maybe a day before but it was still very sad. I told her of course I would after all i love spending time with him anyway he's one of those really smart and wise older men who speaks with dignity and refinement that everything sounds important...almost like James Earl Jones or Morgan Freeman. Wednesday comes along and were driving along and he is telling me all about his chemo, his radiation treatment and his diet changes. Then he told me about how amazingly efficient the hospital was with dealing with all the patients and how it reminded him of being a part on an assembly line. When we got there I was what he meant. As soon as we walked in the building we stood in line. When we got to the front he gave the lady at the desk his name and she typed some shit in the computer and we hoped on the elevator. When we got to the next floor he told me about a class he was taking on adult learning behaviors and not very long after he started they called his name over the intercom. He excused himself and I looked through a stack of magazines until I found one with an article about the guy who wrote the very hungry caterpillar. Fifteen minutes later he emerges from the door and we hopped back on the elevator. This time we went to the lab where he stood in line for a number and I watched the tv hanging from the ceiling talk about glow in the dark puppies. When he got his number he sat next to me but neither one of us talked this time because this waiting room was more crowded. They eventual called his number and he came out so quick I thought he forgot something, but I guess it doesn't take long to draw blood. After that we left.
The Next Wednesday he didn't tell me but when I got to his house to get him he was already gone. The Wednesday after that she showed up a little early to make sure i could still take him. Which I could. On the car ride up this time I noticed his mood was alot darker. He told me the week before a friend form his mens group wanted to take him so he let him. I said that was fine. I didn't mind. Then he was quiet for a bit then he started to tell me about a conversation he had with his long time friend on the phone that morning. I don't remember it verbatim but in short he said they were talking about his cancer and how much of a shock it was to him. How he lived what he felt was a pretty healthy life and didn't really smoke or drink heavily yadda yadda yadda. Then his friend says something like "I feel like we all (talking about their whole group of friends) will get cancer if we live long enough." As he said this the lightning flashed and the thunder sounded in my mind. I never realized it but I felt the same way. In my subconscious I always felt like dying of old age was the same as dying from cancer. At that moment I felt almost ashamed of myself. I told my neighbor that i felt that way too for so long and never thought about it. Maybe it was because most of the old people I knew died that way or it happened to them that I just figured it inevitable. Then in his made for t.v. voice he said "Well let's hope thats not the case. I would like to think that one should be able to enjoy their old age and their retirement. Do things like go fishing, and take trips without being bound to daily treatment and hospitals." And at that moment I felt it again., another great big weight was surgically removed from my head and this time I didn't even know it was there. I had been walking around with a fear of spontaneous human cancer all this time and had no clue. "you know what all the doctors I saw asked me when I was diagnosed?" He continued. "They asked me how I lived my life? did I take care of myself. And it's funny because before all this nobody was asking me anything like that. So my advice to you is make sure you take the best care of yourself and your body because nobody is going to tell you to do it, but when something goes wrong everyone will ask 'why you didn't'." I was relived to be giving a possible alternative of the morbid picture of growing old I painted myself. Dying of old age didn't exactly have to be the same as dying of cancer. I a felt pressure knowing that I had to change the way I lived my life if I was going to seize it. I don't live to bad now. I try to live healthy but mostly in terms of extremes like no smoking, drugs or excessive drinking. No wild unprotected sex with random women, no staring into the sun while wearing 3D glasses that kind of stuff. But I don't exercise enough I eat to much fast food, my diet isn't balanced and this stuff matters too. We had a very interesting and enlightening conversation about life health and getting older. on the ride up and the rest of the trip went pretty much as the one before it. And every Wednesday after that a different person from his mens group has been taking him so I haven't needed to, But I really enjoyed our conversations and had a really good time the two days I did take him and kind of wish we could do it again. it's funny because as i write that I'm like wait a minute the dude live two houses over I could go talk to him whenever LOL that's funny I guess it just wouldn't be that same that way though