Even the Bad Times are Good

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.