Ways to Live Forever

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Recording!

Don't look at me, this was your idea.

Today is January the seventh.

This is my first diary entry.

This is a video-book,

and everything I write down here...

I'm going to record on this video

so my memory will live forever.

What you do that for!!!

Go and fix it.

Me?! You go and fix it.

Actually, the idea

for the video book wasn't mine,

it was Mrs Willis...

though everything really began

a long time before that...

the afternoon I came home.

Five facts about me.

One, my name's Sam;

two, I'm twelve years old;

three, I collect stories

and fantastic facts;

four, I have leukemia.

And five:
by the time you see this,

I'll probably be dead.

Sam

It's your new room.

So you don't have

to climb the stairs...

This diary is a collection

of stories, images,

questions and facts...

and it's also my story.

Good.

As for the way I look;

Mohave hair.

Last year it all fell out

because of the medicine I was taking,

but it's grown back.

It's brown...light brown.

I've got green eyes.

I've got tons of bruises.

It's not my fault,

it's what happens

when you get leukemia.

Oh!, I forgot.

I have a birth mark the shape

of a four-leaf clover on my knee,

but it doesn't grant any wishes.

What's the point of being ill

if I have to study?

It's our first day, Felix.

And it could be our last.

So?

Doesn't it say anything

to you at all?

The question has gnawed away

at humanity for centuries...

How no to dying.

Come on then, think of ways

to live forever.

Get turned into a vampire,

and that's you.

As long as you don't run

into Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Very good, Sam?

Get them to freeze you.

Then in hundreds of years time

a company will find a cure

for cancer and the secret

of eternal life,

and then they can defrost you.

What a load of rubbish.

The safest way is

to copy your brain onto a hard disk

and live eternally on a computer...

and hope you don't get a virus.

Over the centuries,

humans have discovered

that living forever isn't possible,

but there is something eternal

we can leave behind.

Works of art.

Mrs. Willis told us about

how works of art lodge themselves

into people's hearts.

She told us we should write

something about ourselves.

I know you both like to read,

she said to us.

We like reading because

there was no telly in the hospital.

My sister Ella is seven.

My Mum called me Sam 'cause

of Samson from the Bible,

and my Dad chose Ella

for my sister after an Aunt of his.

They didn't realise Sam n' Ella together

sounds just like...salmonella.

Is Sam still sick?

She asks too many questions.

Sam isn't going to the hospital anymore.

He's going to stay at home with us.

So, why isn't he going to school?

I don't have to go back

to the hospital or to school,

because I'm going to die.

Darling, don't say that.

Dying is the most waffle thing

in the world.

No one knows anything.

You ask them questions

and they cough and change the subject.

If I grow up, I'm going

to be a scientist.

I'm going to work out the answers

to all these questions no one answers.

Now I'm going to give

some information about my illness.

People say I've got leukemia,

but I like to say I have granular,

spheroidal globules.

Some guy called John Hughes

Bennett discovered leukemia.

In 1850, he looked at some kid's blood

through a microscope

and said it was full of colorless,

granular, spheroidal globules.

They were white blood cells,

but nobody knew that back then.

The reason it took so long

to diagnose children

was that they didn't used

to let kids into hospitals,

'cause they thought they carried

infections... very weird, isn't it?

It's working!

I did tell you it wasn't going to work.

Let's go get it.

Have you thought about what I said

about writing something

about yourselves?

I don't think me enjoying reading

has anything to do with

writing something about myself.

I think it has a lot,

much more than you think.

Books are just about kids

saving the world

or getting beaten up at school.

Who's going to be interested

in my story?

The tragic story of Sam Mac Queen.

A poor, frail, child

who struggles against

terrible suffering and has to

put up with hospitals with no television.

Bulldogging!

Goodbye friends, loved ones..

Don't forget to put my glasses

on me at my funeral.

There will be no dying in the sand.

Come on!

I'd be interested

in your story, Sam.

Anyway, what does

she know about hospitals.

Felix is right.

We're real experts

when it comes to hospitals.

In fact, we met in one.

Wow...that was close!

Why are you hiding?

I'm going to the shop.

Where youd get them from?

The machine in my uncle's pub...

but I've run out.

Smoking is bad for you,

it can kill you.

Sure.

If I manage to get past them,

I might be able to get somebody

to buy me a packet downstairs.

You know, tell them my last dying

wish on earth is for a cigarette.

That won't work.

You'd be better saying

you have a very rich,

dying uncle who will give a reward

to whoever buys him some smokes.

Sure.

Coming then?

Is his last wish.

My uncle is a very rich man,

and he'd be willing

to give you a tidy sum

of money if you help him.

No, it's not my sister.

It's the surgeon who's going

to operate on her.

His hands won't stop shaking

and a cigarette would do wonders

for his nerves.

I've got withdrawal symptoms.

In my state, it's very dangerous

to give up smoking.

Don't believe everything

they tell you, son.

I smoked like a chimney

and they said I was going to die,

I'm 95 years old,

and I stopped smoking

It's a school assignment.

I have to check how many people

in a cancer ward would accept a cigarette.

You could do a questionnaire.

A boy in the children's ward asked me

to get them for him.

If I don't, he's going

to beat us up.

Questions nobody answers number 1:

how do you know when you've died?

All the information you're about

to hear has been taken

Near-death experiences:

the case against,

by Felix Stranger.

The flaw in the theory is

that people don't actually die.

They're just people whose brains have

gone funny because of a shortage

of oxygen or cause they're

on some weird drugs.

If they're for real, why does it

only happen in America?

And how come only nice things happen?

It's just people wanting to be famous.

Near-death experiences:

the case in favour, by Sam McQueen.

In a near death experience,

the person actually dies.

And then comes back.

So it's obvious that everything

that happens is real.

They see real things.

For example, a woman was floating

on the ceiling and she heard

the doctors say stuff that later

she found out they'd actually said.

Good things don't always happen.

One guy felt elves poking him

with pitchforks... and Plato...

Hey! I haven't finished yet.

Near-death experiences.

Conclusions.

The best thing

about near-death experiences

is being able to go to heaven,

being famous...

and elves poking you with pitchforks.

My mum used to work in a charity.

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