TWENTY YEARS FROM NOW....

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” Mark Twain

As I sit down to right I am peeling a beyond belief fragrant clementine.  It is soothing to remove the peel with great care and delicious to inhale the fragrance that somehow seems to clear my muddled head. The day is spectacular here in South Texas at about 65 degrees, bird egg blue skies and golden leaves falling from the trees, almost as if it were autumn. So many simple pleasures that most take for granted in the scurry of each day. As I bite into each segment of the clementine, I want to remember the moment, the  aroma, the taste.  Today my house is peaceful, quiet and serene.  A blessing, a gift and a moment to catch my breath. The dogs surround me and are breathing softly, with toys nearby.  They seem to have not a care in the world.

So this Friday I ask what would you do that you haven't done.  Where would you be bound if you were to sail away from your safe harbor.  Where would you like to explore, dream and discover?

Mark Twain's quote above sounds unbelievably delicious in its simplicity doesn't it?  But where does reality fit in.  The day to day boredom of the same routine, the same bills to pay, the same bank accounts to balance, the floor to vacuum, the car to wash, the dogs to bathe, the grind of everyday life seems to sometimes leave us lifeless and drab and dragging and sad.

Today as most days I want to catch the trade winds in my sails.  But the piles and piles of unattended paperwork on my desk mound in stacks that never seem to disappear., but grow ferociously.  I have books on the side table intriguing in their titles, such as Meditations to Heal your Life, The Daily Book of Positive Quotations, Soul Happy, Bow Wow Tao and The Power of Pause.  I pick them up occasionally and glance through them, intent on reading them to conclusion one day.  Then something always gets in the way, stops me dead in my tracks and says no you mustn't read that book...you have other things to tend to.

But where do I dare to dream, discover and explore?  Where do I escape to when I need to remember how to breathe and who I am inside the me the everyone else sees?  I guess today I have no answers, only questions and a yearning that is indefatigable in its pursuit of me.

Maybe life is found in the little things.  Maybe life is found in a fragrant clementine, as I sit at my computer and have the freedom and ability to write words for you to read.  Perhaps life is where we are right now, right here, right at this desk in this room, with three sleepy dogs and a window with a piercing blue sky over my right shoulder.

So today as Eleanor Roosevelt said, I  will face life honestly and courageously.  I will enjoy what I am finding peaceful today and perhaps that will better prepare me for tomorrow.  So today I am going to do what I love and let tomorrow fend for itself. 

As for you, I suggest inhaling a clementine.  Twenty years from now we might not have the chance.