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Northwest Living with Dean & Rachel: Live like you are dying
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Anonymous user Wed Nov 30, -0001 00:00:00 PST
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1 response 0 comments It started with a puppy years ago …
I’m 38 years old, and with each passing year, each passing life event, I’m convinced that my end is near.
Just last week, we were all shocked to learn of Dana Reeve’s sudden and somewhat unexpected passing from lung cancer.
If a good person like that can go so early, I’m certainly on borrowed time.
Maybe I’m starting my midlife crisis early. I don’t know.
You’re going to laugh, but I actually went to Barnes & Noble to find a book on what’s “wrong” with me and my new troublesome mindset.
I didn’t find what I went in for, but I did come out with this month’s copy of ATV Sport.
It was in the most awkward way that the subject came up again this week. It’s a hard topic to try to sustain as small talk — “So, Bob, when do you think you’re going to die?”
It’s just not something you discuss in the express lane at Albertsons.
I guess the subject of death is one of those things that’s not to be forced.
This time around, it was our aging dog Amber who was to blame. I actually meant it when I told my wife Lisa that we’d better buy that travel trailer. The one we’ve been eyeing, so we can get the old dog out camping before she dies.
What an odd way to justify a purchase.
I couldn’t be more serious, though, this dog is most alive when she’s sitting around a campfire or wading through a river to find her stick. Amber is like our first kid, and there’s a part of me that honestly believes that we owe her the best life possible in these next few brief years.
The real problem is that I’m struggling with applying this logic to people.
My dad has been frail for years, and now that he’s getting up there in age and seems to be slipping, don’t I owe it to him to give him all of my time and energy and love before he’s gone?
If I do, is it really for him?
My mom and I share many similar interests, and I’ve always wanted to go to Europe with her, but there’s never enough time ... I’m in a ratings period, I’ve got the kids, the car’s not running, blah blah blah.
Lisa and I want to go to Hawaii for our 15th anniversary this summer, but you know how it is, money’s tight ... maybe next year ...
I disappoint myself when I choose to live normally as opposed to “live like I was dying” as the country song suggests.
But, the problem with living a song’s lyrics is that the alarm clock goes off in the morning and the mortgage is still due next week.
There’s a balance, I’m sure, yet it’s one that keeps me struggling.
I kid Lisa, and tell her that with all this angst, “I’m due for my midlife sports car and trade-in wife.”
She just laughs, and informs me she’s happy to continue pretending that I’m funny, just as she did when we were teenagers — back when we thought we would live forever.

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