Talk all you want about how you’ve lived a full and meaningful life, did more good than bad, got right with God and the universe, and how you’re ready and good to go with yourself and others.

I suspect at that moment, when shown the light toward which we all must one day walk, all those noble words of satisfaction, peace and readiness will instantly vanish, meaningless and in vain, eagerly traded in a panic for just one more day, hour or minute to make the one change you always dreamed about but overlooked and never righted in this life, and at that point, never will.

My friend, if you’re scrambling for a reason, this is why you’re still alive.

Carpe diem.

Good morning, yesterday

You wake up, and time has slipped away And suddenly it’s hard to find The memories you left behind Remember, do you remember?

It was 1975 when I was just shy of 16, counting myself lucky to have found a legally licensed friend to drive us both on double dates to sophomore prom. As with all proms, it was themed after a popular song of the time. Paul Anka was big back then and “Times of your Life” had just hit Kasey Kasem’s top 10, earning it the theme of our adolescent gala. Today at 61, single and dateless for 11 years, I heard the song again this past Sunday morning on the oldies station and sang along with all the memories it wafted up from days gone by. Back then, and as adolescents with seemingly immortal lives ahead of them often do, we thought it was all about us. We’d understood the song to be about the hope of what lied ahead of us, not of one man’s reflection backward on those experiences which had already long passed into memory.

Tinkering along in the garage as old men do, I was signing a song that brought back so many great memories of high school, while at the same time realizing it was truly a song of reflection on times and experiences long since passed. And a lot has passed indeed. Almost half a century. I thought “So what do I have to show for those 50 years?” What have been those times of my life in particular they say race through your mind like celluloid as you wave and take your final bow only to retire your sore ash self dusted to the four winds over a favorite place you once knew and remembered?

Apart from a knack for run-on sentences, a lot.

My list would first include people like my kids and grandkids, my family, my best friends, my dog, a few bosses, a few pastors, several complete strangers, all of whom might either not exist or whose lives would otherwise be quite different without having spent at least some time or interactions with me. Indeed, they represent the most significant times of my life.

Next would be circumstances. My marriage, even my divorce, my family ad agency, my drug addiction, my recovery, my work with poor seniors and the homeless, and the times I spent writing stories about all these times of my life for others to experience. Finally, I’ve spent much of my life urging my kids to “like things, and love people,” And as one who just recently gave away 95% of my possessions as part of a purge while moving my residence, I condensed all things that ever mattered at all into a 5×5 storage space, which is still more than I can take with me. I’m not terribly thankful for the things I’ve accrued over half a century. In fact, I can’t think of any item that has made any time of my life any more memorable. Honest reflection makes gratitude easy. At 61, I’m most thankful that memorable people and memorable experiences, good and bad, are all that seem to matter anymore. At 16 and self-centered with my whole life ahead of me, I never imagined that this time of my life would be the time of my life.

Good morning, yesterday.

We never really stop worrying about our kids even when they’re adults.

It’s a lot like wearing a heart monitor that goes off at all times of the day and night alerting you to pray for at least one of them at that moment.

I just woke from a nightmare about my kids and my fatherly superstition alerted me to take pause. Of course, I can’t risk a 1am text or a call but I can always risk a prayer. They’re entirely unaware I spend these times tuning frequencies to their private channels to spy if they might be hurt, happy, worried, in harm’s way or just in secret need of something no one else may understand, save the one who’s known them since before they were born.
I’ll have no need to teach them this parental peculiarity. They’ll learn to trust this phenomenon all by themselves when we are long gone and their own are away at school, asleep down the hall, or on a midnight road of crazy drivers protected only by the angels we’ve dispatched to their mercy by knee from our midnight bedsides.

Kids may be all grown up but they’ll never outgrow our duties and responsibilities to psychically worry and silently intervene as I am, and perhaps you are, right now at this very moment.

Today is just another day, but I have my suspicions.

A fresh beginning to a new year, a clean page on life’s calendar, a symbolic start to better intentions, clarity in focus, or maybe a simple sentimental morning to contemplate the parade route of your life. A day off work, extra time to wipe slates and imagine how the new year might unfold. Some will wake desperate for aspirin and coffee, football distractions or to clean up wild night messes before sleeping away the day’s remains from which they only recently arrived home.

But I suspect more than a sober few will be thinking deeper thoughts from time to time today. Plans for self-restraint, to be a little nicer, quit a bad habit or start one better. For today’s curious and contemplative minds the options are limitless. So, applause to those making use of this new day as a personal prompt for positive change, at least in thought, if not in deed. It’s a good day for it. Some require an external catalyst like a nodal event or an arbitrary date of a year to be propelled into deeper thoughts and richer inner lives. Shocking or startling, they shake us to our cores begging for change, forcing us once again into the awful truth: We waited for something to force our hand, but also the glorious redemption that the only difference between last year’s regrets and this year’s successes is another day, and how we use it.#LifeMeansSoMuch#LMSM

I could pull drama out of most any hat I own today but today isn’t about me now is it? The only drama befitting this day is about young couple with a newborn who brought light and hope into a darkened world, act one scene one, and whose story would be told everywhere anyone would listen, believe and follow on a path to life everlasting.

So pipe down about old uncle Joe’s manners, the burnt cinnamon rolls, what you didn’t get from Santa or whatever story you’ve come up with to one up the greatest one ever told. Today is not about them, me or you except for what we all do with the awesome fact that God so loved the world that he gave his only Son that whoever believes in Him will live forever. 2

Now give up the drama and go get a real life. Literally.

It’s not called a merry Christmas for nothing.