Sentence:  In barely the blink of an eye, the perfectly healthy Judy entered a permanent vegetative state. ... What haunted me was the idea that one moment you're gazing at your 2-year-old in her playroom and the next, you, the mother, have been whisked off into the <WSD>ether</WSD> forever. 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  The sky, the heavens; the void, nothingness.