Day: February 21, 2021

I sometimes see the question “If you had the chance to live your life over again, would you do it?”

Of course none of us ever will….

And when I see this question, people usually qualify the answer: “Well, if I knew what I know now…” or “If I could make just a couple of changes…”

I tell you straight to the point, that I would. I’d do it again just exactly the same without changes anything one iota. I’d take the pain and heartache of burying a child, just to see her again through the nursery window.

I’d go through the agony of my parents death, just to hear their voices again. I’d let Mom hit me on the head with my bow again. I’d endure watching Porter Wagoner.
I’d wait til I was 16 again to see the Ocean for the first time. I’d rinse poop out of cloth diapers to have the chance for my baby girl to take a nap on my tummy.

I’d buy hot wheels for my boys to crush with rocks and bury under the Elm tree I planted on 9th street. I’d pick cherrys straight off the tree in the blazing Idaho summer sun for my Mother in law to can.

I’d chase lighting bugs all evening until I had a jar full, and take my turn at cranking the old ice cream machine.
I’d smell Grandpa’s pipe tobacco, and the wood smoke from the pot bellied stove. I’d listen to him cuss when I’d turn over his “spit can” I’d relish the taste of Grandma’s fried apples and homemade lard biscuits.

I’d take the two heart attacks a stent, and four bypasses and a year of recovery to see baby Eli and Rue come in the door the first time again.

I’d play countless games of hearts at the student center at West Georgia college to fall in love with my wife. I’d run off the road in a rain storm on our wedding night and double back to Dalton to a tiny little hotel room.

I would load tractor trailer loads of matresses by myself in 100+ degree weather, so I could have Saturday off to go to the baseball card show.

I would do all the stupid things again, just to do a few of the smart things. I’d take the ass chewings, and countless hours of driving out and back to work in Calhoun and Dalton just to have the hugs and the kisses from the ones I have loved, and do still love.

We will never have that chance…perhaps…depending on your philosophy, or depending on how the Universe works. Who knows really how it does work? All I can say is that the joy has vastly outshined the sadness.

Yes, I’d do it again. Unqualified and unquestioned if I could.

To the people who I have loved and who are now gone: I try and remember you as much as possible! I try and think of you each and every day! It’s not maudlin to remember your loved ones and the happy memories you had with them. I think it’s theraputic. It keeps them alive in your memory. They exist there as they once existed physically here on Earth. I try not to think in a mournful way, but in honor.

And, as one song I have heard so succinctly puts it, “Even the bad times are good” We learn from the bad times how better to enjoy the good. We learn from the bad times that we are all human. There are no perfect people. Not now.

I always thought the tiny old house in which we used to live to be a symbol of not succeeding.

As I grow older, I am trying to leave better memories than I did when I was a younger man. I was so self absorbed, and trying always to “get ahead” and “make ends meet” How little I knew about life. How off the mark I was about what constitues happiness. I’m not sure if it’s the dwindling years, or the gathering of more tender memories with those around me. It really doesn’t matter now. What matters is that most days I remember to try and leave a memory with somebody.

Now when I think back, I remember the times when everyone was packed in together. We were close. We grew closer. Three kids and their friends. Games played and meals eaten. Shows watched together in silence or in noisy celebration. Report cards reviewed, and papers written and assissted with. Research which benefited me as much as it did the primary party. Situations discussed and problems resolved…..or not. Life lived!

So, I guess it is not so bad. Not really a “sign of success or failure” My grandchildren used to run and crawl the halls and draw on the walls. I didn’t care. If you had looked around, you’d have seen crayon pictures hanging and momentos magnetized to the refrigerator. You’d have seen kid’s books partially filling the bookshelfs and plastic crates full to the top with stuffed bears and letter blocks. My wife sat not eight feet away from me. I’m glad she was that close, and still is….

So, in twenty or thirty years, or whenever my time is over, I hope I’ll have made enough memories in the heads of some of my favorite people that they might even think back and remember when I wrote a little post about it.

I spend some time every day looking at some things under high magnification. I do this for things I think I’m going to sell…I look through high power loops at stones and marks on silver and what not. Sometimes I use a black light with the magnification and I can tell you, what appears ordinary when viewed with the naked eye is sometimes extraordinary under magnification.

I know that scientists look at things under such powerful magnification that they have gone down to what they think of as the smallest particle in existence, which they call a quark. I wonder if it really is the smallest….or if it just goes on and on.

I went to take my dogs out last week, and the stars were coming out and looked gorgeous. Sometimes in the past I have used a telescope to stretch the reach of my eyes farther out into the Universe.

What is obscured by the light of day is beautified by the quiet calm of night.

I know that scientists have telescopes which have stretched out to the edges of the Universe and they have theories about how old our Universe is, and when the “big bang” started it out.

I truly wonder if the nature of existence stretches to infinity in both directions? I know that science fiction writers have used their imaginations many times to “stretch” the way we look at things. I enjoy those types of books.

We think we know so much, when we actually know very little. We are just scratching the surface. We need to keep scratching and see what we find.