Mortality

I had every intention to take you all to the lake today, however, the weather is not in favor of us going as it is pouring down for hours now and the friendly weather frogs aren't going to climb that lovely ladder today.  So I am left here at my kitchen table, starring out of the window, watching the rain pounding against my window and the wind bending every limb on our trees.  The clouds are dark and of fast movement to make room for just another dark cloud ready to dump another inch on us.

It's funny, this thing we call life, isn't it?  Nothing can stop it.  It goes on whether we want it to or not.  We are forced to take on each day and take the consequences either with acceptance or disagreement, but we have to take one way or the other, whether we want to or not.  We are forced to take on everything it tosses at us.  Even when our life comes to an end.. we surely don't make that decision, do we?  At least most of us aren't making that call to end our life.  As my step-dad is laying in the ICU after finally receiving a much needed kidney transplant, we all find ourselves overwhelmed with happiness.  Even though we all know that this is not the final end of the story.  As of now, we are still waiting for that kidney to kick into gear and work as it should.  We celebrated the fact that there is a kidney for him, then we celebrated the fact that he survived the operation.  Now we are waiting for a few more celebrations to come in his journey.

This can go all kinds of different ways.  And although I wish to ignore the many possible outcomes for this I can't help but think of how ironic "life" really is.  You may disagree with me all you want, but a lot of the things we do, things we buy, things we declare as necessities, things we believe to be of importance... when facing the end, all this seems to be so silly, such a waste of time, so sad, really.  For instance, Wearing jewelry...  what does that do to your life when wearing expensive diamonds on your fingers?  Does that really do anything other then boost your ego?  Inviting your friends to a big and breathtaking house... what does that do to your life?  again, only boosting your ego?  driving up to the office in an expensive car that serves no purpose whatsoever, what does that do to your life?  boosting the ego once again?  And when you face your last day on this planet, do you think this all will still be of same importance? (And I know I am being hypocritical here!)  How about people...  we all meet people.. every day we stand before new faces and make a "conscious" decision.  Do we engage that person?  Two answers.. yes or no.  You make that decision based on what you see or based on your circumstances.  We meet a person and within a blink of an eye we categorize them as friend, crush, lover, enemy, stupid, ignorant etc., sometimes we even give it two blinks before creating the label.  Why?  When you face the last day of your life, did it really matter? What if you gave the person the wrong label and perhaps missed out on love, missed out on a great friendship?  Just simply missed out on anything? But then again, we sometimes hang on to the wrong people, the wrong opportunities, suffer the pain they inflict on us.  Sometimes we finally let go and pick up the pieces and sometimes we just keep enduring the mental lashes without really knowing why or making excuses to explain the why.  But sometimes, we even let the good people or opportunities slip away from us and later wish we would not have done so, accompanied by pain of the self inflicted lashes.  Why?

Continuation of a life is out of our hands. We can take steps to give us the possibility of a long life, but no matter what steps we take, how much we exercise, how many vitamins we swallow, how much broccoli we eat... it's still not a guarantee.  He is laying in bed hooked to  machines that hopefully help to give him more years to his already spent life.  And those machines better do the job so he can walk the paths of life along side with us for quite some time to come.  I wonder if his "living" will change.  If he will put different priorities up.  Or will he live his life as he did before?  When I am faced with my last day here on earth, I "hope" I can look back and say that there is no question left unanswered, there is no feeling left un-felt, there is not a piece of curiosity unexplored, there is not a feeling of love that got lost, there is not a person left out there I should have met, there is not an unfulfilled dream waiting to be realized, there is not a person wondering what he/she meant to me, that I meant something to someone, or that something I did meant something to someone...  If I were to die tomorrow, and I look back today, then I surely have failed for I need to meet more people, learn so much more, explore, love, feel, realize more dreams...

Whenever I drive by a cemetery and see a blue tent up, I always tell myself, "hopefully, he/she could leave this earth a happy person with nothing unanswered, nothing un-experienced, nothing un-felt and always remembered".