From Cradle To Grave
“You know I’ve had close calls, when it could’ve been me. I was young when I learned just how fragile life can be. I lost friends of mine. I guess it wasn’t my time. Timing is everything. I could’ve been the child that God took home and I would have been one more unfinished song…” – Country Strong, Timing Is Everything
Hello Dear Friend,
“Anna, wake up! Wake up! C’mon!...” Riley yelled into Anna’s ear with her hand clawed over Anna’s shoulder vigorously shaking her in an ill attempt to wake Anna.
“Riley, we gotta go!” Jesse tried grabbing his girlfriend’s arm to pull her up from where she sat crouched over Anna. Still yelling and pleading for her friend to wake up as her tears now left streaks of makeup she pulled her arm away from Jesse. “Riley! C’mon, the cops are coming.”
It was true! Everyone could hear the police sirens in the distance. The sound of the sirens grew louder and louder as they approached and everything became even more chaotic. Everyone scattered into various directions to attempt an escape. Some paused to grab another fist full of pills on the way out of the old abandoned warehouse. Other’s chugged whatever alcohol still lingered in the red plastic cups they’d been holding onto before disposing the cup onto the warehouse for and running off. The old warehouse had become the party location for this small town’s college kids and high school’s upperclassmen in recent years.
“We have to call an ambulance.” Riley sobbed, still not moving, “I don’t think she’s breathing!”
“The cops will do it. C’mon!” Jesse grabbed her arm again.
Riley continued to sob, shook her head and managed to whisper the word, “No” in response to her boyfriend’s plea.
“That’s it,” Jesse thought as he picked Riley up off of the ground. She started to kick and scream and tried to get her arms free from her sides but Jesse had them bound in a bear hold as he carried her away. “Damn it, Riley! Do you hear those sirens? They keep getting louder. That means the cops are almost here. You’re drunk and at the very least I’m buzzed. Not to mention the fact that we started the night out high from the drugs we took when we first got here. There’s too much booze and pills lying around here and too many people that are either passed out, strung out, or puking their guts out. Anna is wasted. She’ll be fine the cops will make sure of that. She just partied a little too hard is all, that girl really needs to learn when to stop. We’ve got to get out of here before we’re caught and arrested! Now stop fighting me, we have to go!”
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Three hours had gone by and the events of the night had finally calmed considerably. One of the responding officers on duty headed towards the last remaining ambulance. “These kids and their Pharming parties, when do you think they will learn?” The officer asked the paramedic just as they were zipping up a black body bag.
“It’s tragic.” The paramedic answered as they scanned a clipboard. “Anna Brunsteen,” He read, “This girl was only 17. Now, her life is just over before it had a chance to even begin.”
“She’s the only casualty right?” The officer asked.
The paramedic closed up the back of the ambulance, “This time around.”
Timing Is Everything
Have you every truly thought about just how fragile life is? Many of us take it for granted, procrastinate and waste our days because we think we have the time. Other’s live on the edge, making poor decisions as they live for the moment, not paying any heed to the consequences.
I, like many, have had to say good-bye to far too many people throughout the course of my young life. Friends and family members, some young, some old, some were expected – with other’s… it was like being thrown a curve ball.
Although the story above is fiction, it hits far too close to home. My cousin overdosed just before we turned twenty-one, she fell asleep one night and never woke up. My best friend buried her father on my 21st birthday. When I was a teenager, my father lost his best friend to cancer just seven weeks after the diagnosis. My other best friend, just a couple months after turning thirty, never left the operating table. My uncle’s life tragically ended in the chilling waters of Lake Michigan…
These of course were the tragedies. The truth is we’ll never know all the things God saved us from over the course of a day, a month, or even a year.
Live With Intention
“Ben: When the heck did we get old? Gloria: I’ve always been old Ben. You know what though, I don’t mind. I mean if my muscles ache it’s because I’ve used them. If it hurts to walk up those stairs it’s because I walked up them every night to lie down next to a man who loved me. I’ve got a few wrinkles here and there but I’ve laid under thousands of skies on sunny days. I look and feel this way well because I drank and I smoked, I lived and I loved, danced, sang, sweat, and screwed my way through a pretty damn good life. Trust me, getting old ain’t bad man, getting old – that’s earned.” –Dialog between Ben & Gloria, The Guardian
Now, I’ll bet that if you took the day off and went on a field trip to a retirement home to spend the day talking with its residents and asking them what kind of advice they could give you on how to live your life, they would probably all give you similar advice. Some of them might even quote John Lennon to you as say that “Life happens while you’re busy making other plans.”
Older and wiser in years because they’ve learned from a lifetime of mistakes as well as successes they’d probably advise you to learn from them. I can imagine their advice would be something along the line of the trending phrase “be present” coming from the #adulting culture. Seriously thought, I believe the advice would be to remain consciously aware of every moment and enjoy your life wherever it takes you.
Many miss out on the beautiful life and the little moments that make it so because they are too focused on the hustle and on things that didn’t really matter much. If I were seeking advice from Gloria, quoted above, or someone like her I’d get an honest answer. I’ll even bet it would be somewhat of a firecracker response like, “Take the leap. Do the things that scare you. Sure, you’ll go through pain, you’ll have scares, you’ll feel heartbreak but you’ll have major comebacks too. So take the bull by the horns kiddo and ride. Ride until the very end. Life is meant to be enjoyed, it’s meant to be lived. Escape in the things that bring you happiness.”
We’re so busy fighting to live that too much of the time we don’t realize that we are living. This is it. You only get one shot at it, it’s not a rehearsal. This is the live show and it keeps rolling, without any stops or do-over’s. Your life is what you decide to make it. Don’t wake up years from now wondering what happened, where the time went or what went wrong.
Earned – like a badge of great courage. I’ve always loved the picture Gloria painted for Ben in her description about getting older. For so many, they’re robbed of their time on earth and are never given the chance to grow old because their light dims far too soon. For the young souls like my cousin who weren’t long for this world, they never had that chance. They never had the opportunity to earn everything that comes with growing older. It’s true, we don’t know where tomorrow will take us which makes it even more important to bask in the beauty of what you have today and enjoy were you’re at in life in the here and now before it disappears.
I don’t know about you, but I want to live like Gloria. I want to feel a sore muscle or two every now and then knowing that they’ve been put to good use. I want to look down at my scars and be reminded of the stories attached to them however crazy or stupid they may be. I want to look into the mirror and flaunt the wrinkles that have surfaced over the years, formed from endless laughter and time spent in the sun. I want to be exhausted from my latest adventure. I want to latch on and hug you like I haven’t seen you in years even if I just saw you yesterday. I want to love like Leo loved Paige (The Vow). I want to laugh like a child, dance and sway, sing and be merry, sweat and play, and eat and drink my way through a beautiful history found in a life well lived.
How do you want to live?
With love,
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