Carpe_Diem

I'm not one you worries about endings that much. In my experience, they are difficult to predict and arrive suddenly. Jobs, marriages, friendships, passions are all here until they are not. Buddhists believe that everything is disintegrating from the moment it is created. So do I. Permanence is an illusion. Thinking back on the giants I've known and how I could not conceive of a world without them and now what do I have? I have a world without them.

I am not implying that my wife or your is going to leave either of us tomorrow, although you never know what's going to happen tomorrow. Because all rules have exceptions, there are cases where things apparently haven't changed over the course of my lifetime. No matter what I've done, and I have certainly done much, my dear Mom has always been there. Always. Always. Always.

Within one month's time, I went from a child walking in a line to the lunchroom, raising my hand when I wanted to speak and asking permission to use the bathroom to being handed a rifle and shooting at human silhouettes representing the enemies of my country. Childhood ended abruptly at the gates of Ft. Benning. More than once, I had a job when I woke up and didn't have one when I went to sleep. It could happen again tomorrow.

Any reunion worth its salt will have a table with pictures of those who could not be there to celebrate. Because they died. In fact they start dying immediately, and they just keep on doing it. The rest of us keep getting up and going to work until we join them and someone puts our picture in the table at the next reunion.

I have a point.

I'm getting to it.

Just live. Do your job and try not to love it or hate it too much. It's just a job. Love your wife today. Don't wait for things to get better or different before you're ready to put in that extra effort. Friendships can wither if you don't water them, so fill up your bucket and make some phone calls or get in your car and go see someone. If you have a passion, and god I hope you do because that's what makes life worth living, then act on it today. Ride your bike, write in your journal, get out your camera, go to the gym. Do it today. It's all you have.

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