The call.....

7:32 am - Mountain Time - Monday - 37° F , 31% humidity, wind 8 mph out of the north.....clear blue skies for another day.  Got down to 56° F in the bedroom.....BRRRR!

Periodically something occurs in your life which has the immediate effect of recentering your life......a kind of reset, if you will.  Let's face it, at 67 TLE and I are chronologically old now.  We are both still young at heart, but our days on earth are becoming more finite with each birthday.  It is easy to become a little self absorbed in this lifestyle, and sometimes it takes something out of the blue to grab your attention and make you refocus on what is most important in your life.  

We received one of those calls yesterday morning you just don't want to get......you know almost immediately from the tone of the caller's voice they are preparing to give you news you don't want to hear.  Instinctually your mind begins racing ahead of the words it is hearing trying to guess what the bad news is.....you hang on every spoken word trying to discern the news....then you hear the news, and then begin to process it, and then you hear yourself exclaiming.......OH NO!  You begin to think of all those whose lives will be inexorably affected by that news......the ripples of this news have already begun to spread across the universe touching one life after another.  A person in your life, not immediate family, but a big part of your life nonetheless, who is about your age did not wake up Sunday morning.  We all secretly, or maybe not so secretly, would like to go to sleep one night and just not wake up, rather than die slowly of some horrible disease.  For the person who passes in this fashion it is a blessing, but for those left behind it is devastating.  There is no time to mentally prepare......it's just there without warning......your loved one is no longer 'here'.

Once the shock wears off a little you remember you are the same age of the person who just passed......you're in good health......they were in seemingly good health......you're active.....they were active.  There are no guaranteed tomorrows.....there is only today, and maybe not the entire day.  You resolve to live what remains of your life more deliberately.......you resolve to live more in the moment, and to make the most of each minute you have left.  You turn to your spouse to whom you just expressed your love a few minutes before the call, and say it again......you resolve to say "I love you" several times a day to her, and you resolve to tell each of your children that every day until your last breath.  Don't take today, let alone tomorrow for granted....don't leave anything unsaid.

This is one of those downsides to the fulltime life we don't talk often about......what do you do when you are hundreds, if not thousands of miles away when the worst happens to one of your loved ones?  You feel a little helpless......you aren't there to give a hug, to listen to the pain, to encourage, to say "I love you".  

Thank you for putting up with my ramblings today, and thank you so much for stopping by!