As I Lay Dyin'

     So, I finally got around to watching "Limitless".  It was awesome!  That's my kind of flick.
But it got me thinking:  If I could access 100% of my brain, just for one day, what would I do?  Would I learn new languages?  Would I head to Las Vegas and cash out like a crazy person?  Would I write a plan for world peace and submit it to the Nobel Prize committee?

      No. I wouldn't do any of that.  If I only had one day to do anything I could ever want to do, I'd probably organize my entire house, and label everything!  It's a humble dream, but it's mine.  Trying to keep a clean and organized house is a big issue for me, primarily because all of the cleaning and organizing takes so much time away from just hanging out with my family.

      If my home was consummately clean and well-organized, I believe I would dedicate all of my time to being with my husband and children.

      When I look at my life, I look at it from the perspective of: "What will I be thinking about on my deathbed?"  In that moment when all of my years will be slipping away from this world, what will I want to remember?
      I'll remember how excited my daughter was when my son lost his first tooth. She was happier than he was!  I'll remember my kids running through the sprinklers on a summer day, and seeing how far they can spit watermelon seeds.  I'll remember the first time they saw snow, and how beautiful everything was, covered gently in a soft blanket of white.  I'll remember the day my husband proposed to me.  I made him ask me three times before I said yes.  I'll remember honeysuckle, and showing my babies how to get the nectar out of them to eat.  I'll remember how they'd blow dandelions and get a little stuck to their mouths.  I'll remember the first time I cooked dinner for my husband; it was Indian food.  I'll remember how proud he was the first time he mowed his own yard, here in the desert.  I'll remember the Sunday tradition of grilling steaks, regardless of weather; the smells of onions being grilled and hear the sizzle of steaks being flipped, while we argue about the correct level of doneness.

     I suppose these seem like mundane things.  Why wouldn't I remember Amritsar or Goa? Why wouldn't I want to remember that time I went skydiving? Because none of those adventures really matter.  Traveling the world and doing completely crazy things, all for the thrill of new and exciting, well, it's all alright if you don't have what matters most in all the world.  When you have a love that never dies, a love that can't be broken, no matter how you try to hurt it, that's the best thing in the world!  And it's something no amount of adventure or selfish endeavor will ever afford you.

     Love's funny like that; It's a gift.  And it's a weird gift because it's one that you can only get more of if you give it away.  The more freely you give it, the more it falls all around you.  If you try to keep ahold of it, you'll lose it.  No one ever told me that before.  I was always told that love was a give-and-take.  As it turns out, love's a give-and-give-some-more!  The more love I give, the more it boomerangs back at me, with greater depth and force.

     Sometimes, I sit drinking my coffee in the morning, and I start to cry.  It's just all too beautiful for me, the joy and gratitude just pours from my eyes,  My cup runneth over.  The memories make me grateful.  I'm grateful to have been blessed with so much beauty in my life.

     And tonight, we'll grill out steaks, the kids will run and play and eat watermelon.  My husband will ask me for  a rum and iced tea, made in my special way, and marinate steak in beer and his "special seasonings", and I'll have another beautiful, remarkable and amazing memory to think about as I lay dying, and everyday until then.