Inigo Montoya: He’s dead. He can’t talk.

Miracle Max: Whoo-hoo-hoo, look who knows so much. It just so happens that your friend here is only MOSTLY dead.

There’s a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive.

(The Princess Bride)

Some of you may have noticed that I haven’t written anything at Jihad Watch or anywhere else since late April. The reason for this is that my heart stopped.

About six weeks ago, while I was already in the hospital for pneumonia, I suffered heart failure, kidney failure, respiratory failure — you name it, I failed at it. I was airlifted by helicopter from one hospital to another (alas, I don’t remember this adventure) and hooked up to every machine the doctors could find a way to plug me into. Finally, yesterday, I left the hospital (this time, alas, not by helicopter), with most organs having recovered passing grades.

I owe an immense debt of gratitude — indeed, I owe my very life — to the many doctors, nurses, and other medical professionals who helped me get from the time when I had no pulse to this moment. Except for a couple of brief interludes, I was unconscious for about twelve days in late April and early May, so I wasn’t even aware of the presence of many of them, but that doesn’t dim my gratitude. While I had no pulse and was out, I was nowhere: I saw no all-encompassing light, and I heard no voices, a fact which I believe carries no metaphysical or spiritual significance. But I have had ample opportunity to reflect, and I came to some realizations that everyone knows but that many often forget: life is good. Be grateful. Love your family. Consider the lilies. Don’t take things so seriously. Don’t take yourself so seriously. All God’s days are beautiful days. Etc.

And I realized one other thing: the astounding medical technology that pulled me back from nowhere developed, and only could have developed, in a free society. That makes the struggle for freedom of which Jihad Watch and my body of work is an infinitesimal part all the more important. With the darkness and totalitarianism against which we are struggling comes immense human misery. Let us then, with malice toward none and charity for all, continue to strive as long as we have the ability to do so. We owe it to our children, and all children, to try to leave the world as livable a place as we possibly can.

So I hope to be back at it, gradually, in the coming days and weeks. I want to express my warmest thanks to all the faithful readers of Jihad Watch, to Christine Douglass-Williams, who indefatigably and expertly kept the site going in my absence, to all those who contributed articles, and above all to those who offered prayers and good wishes on my behalf. Your prayers were heard, your good wishes granted, and I love you all.