Live your dreams

Believe me, I don't have any kind of morbid fixation and I am not searching out posts on death and dying, but a link in an AOL story led me to a recent post on this blog, Diary of a Dying Mom, and then I was driven to find out why she had started writing the blog in the first place. So, I went back to her very early blog entries where she does explain why, and I found this beautifully written paragraph about living.

Why tell you all this? Misery loves company? I don’t think that is it although I feel less alone when I tell my friends how I am feeling. What I really want to say to all of you is go outside and run. Feel the wind in your hair and the cool air on your cheeks. Run until you feel tired and then be grateful your body lets you do that. Sing at the top if your lungs (even if you sing as badly as Bill does), dance in your bedroom, take the trip that you are dying to take, do the things that make you happy, etc. Bill’s grandfather lived to be 89 and was healthy enough to bike and golf until the last few months of his life; few people are that lucky. Someday you may not be able to do the things that you love so make sure you do them now, while you can. Everything we all said in the days after 9/11, all the promises that we made – spoken or unspoken – need to be made good on. Enjoy the ride folks just in case we only get one go around.

Great advice for anyone at any age, wouldn't you say? And kids know how to do it best. Stop to look at that pretty flower growing out of the crack in the concrete, for tomorrow it may be gone. Put the dirty dinner dishes aside and spend half an hour making funny faces with your kids before they go to bed. Make wishes on stars, and lay on your back in the grass while you're doing it. These are the things that memories are made of.

As for me, Lori and I are still going to take that trip to Buenavista this year to find the perfect spot for the retirement casita. I know Lori won't be sharing the casita or the retirement with me as we had planned, but that doesn't mean that she can't share in the planning and make memories with me that I'll be smiling over as I drink my morning cup of Nescafe on the patio years from now.

Cat