Perspective

Once in the dim and distance past I bought a very fine bottle of whisky because it was bottled the year I was born, I kept it for years and years until it was worth much more than I paid for it, then I got sent a story by email that I've attached below, that week I had a dinner with my parents and my exs parents. After the ladies retired to the lounge I cracked open the bottle and along with my dad and my ex father in law gave that bottle a good seeing to. It was a lovely lovely evening.

The story that inspired this has always been in my mind, it makes me do things that I wouldn't have normally done, if theres something you want to do do it now, if you're worried about the cost, think how much it would be worth to you on your deathbed to have done it. See you all in a month, I'm going to see Everest.

Gillian xx

Carpe diem quam minimum credula postero
Seize the day, put no trust in tomorrow.

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My brother-in-law opened the bottom drawer of my sister's bureau and lifted out a tissue-wrapped package. "This," he said, "is not a slip. This is lingerie."

He discarded the tissue and handed me the slip. It was exquisite, silk, handmade and trimmed with a cobweb of lace. The price tag with an astronomical figure on it was still attached.

"Jan bought this the first time we went to New York, at least 8 or 9 years ago. She never wore it. She was saving it for a special occasion.

Well, I guess this is the occasion." He took the slip from me and put it on the bed with the other clothes we were taking to the mortician.

His hands lingered on the soft material for a moment, then he slammed the drawer shut and turned to me.

"Don't ever save anything for a special occasion.
Every day you're alive is a special occasion."

I remembered those words through the funeral and the days that followed when I helped him and my niece attend to all the sad chores that follow an unexpected death.

I'm still thinking about his words, and they've changed my life.

I'm reading more and dusting less. I'm sitting on the deck and admiring the view without fussing about the weeds in the garden. I'm spending more time with my family and friends and less time in committee meetings.

Whenever possible, life should be a pattern of experience to savor, not endure.

I'm trying to recognize these moments now and cherish them. I'm not "saving" anything; we use our good china and crystal for every special event such a losing a pound, getting the sink unstopped, the first camellia blossom.

I wear my good blazer to the market if I feel like it. I'm not saving my good perfume for special parties; clerks in hardware stores and tellers in banks have noses that function as well as my party going friends.

"Someday" and "one of these days" are losing their grip on my vocabulary. If it's worth seeing or hearing or doing, I want to see and hear and do it now.