Brey Willows

Card 51, Writing Down the Bones: Have you enjoyed your life? (with a focus on the positive)

We remember the negative, don’t we? We’re animals, and we’re trained to remember the negative in order to try and avoid repeating it. Like a coyote that learns the hard way not to eat bad meat.

But to focus on the positive, to remember the beauty? That’s a good way to start a Friday.

When I was little, I fell in love with a stuffed Doberman at the local card shop (cuddly toy, for the UK folks). Mom liked to browse there on her lunch breaks and I’d sit and pet the stuffed dog the whole time. I never asked for it, of course. It was a lot of money for a single mom trying to keep food on the table.

And then Christmas came, and that dog was under the tree. Mom had scrimped and saved all year for it. I think it’s the only Christmas gift I remember getting as a child, because it was so, so special. And I kept it, from move to move, house to house, state to state.

Until the day came when a friend’s little boy would run into the house, find the dog, and sit with it. He’d stroke it, talk to it. Just like I did. And so it left with him one day, so it could have a new home with a child just as in love with it as I’d been.

I remember high school beach parties, proms, university friends. I remember driving through the Rockies for the first time and truly feeling the awe that nature inspires. I loved those mountains so much, and I still picture them as clearly as I could see them that day.

I’ve travelled. Wow, have I travelled. That dirty little street urchin has been to so many countries. I’ve walked through Agamemnon’s palace and imagined the minotaur in the shadows. I’ve climbed steep steps to ancient temples and gone below ground to see tunnels made of skeletons. I’ve seen cities that float, bought handmade paper from a paper maker, watched water fall over icy cliffs, slid down on my butt on ski slopes I couldn’t manage, and snorkelled in water warmer than bath water, and watched a sting ray float by, elegant and breath taking.

And I’ve been loved. By family, by friends, by partners.

My wife proposed on the beach at sunrise on summer solstice, kneeling in a heart created by little blue candles. We got married in a ruined castle and it was pure magic. She meets me each morning with a hug that isn’t rushed. She does a million little things to show me she loves me, that she chose me, and that she’s still in love with me. We laugh and talk and spend, quite literally, 365 days, 24/7 together.

It still doesn’t feel like enough time.

Have I enjoyed life? Yes. Yes I have.