Sunday, August 5, 2012

Breathing in, breathing out

Last night we participated in a celebration of the life of one of our friends who passed away earlier this Spring. Alice left behind not just her husband, who has been my colleague and our friend for more than 40 years, but children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and her own immediate family and friends and more. We gathered to share stories, meet members of the family we had heard about for years, and over dinner and a few drinks, remember our friend. It was a fitting close to a remarkable life and the person who lived it. It was a fine way to begin moving on.

Moving on is after all, for the living. We cannot live if we cannot pass from one place to the next, nor can we take others with us if we aren’t going anywhere. Life is, in my mind at least, about moving forward. Moving to a new plane, moving to a new level, becoming a new version of an old self, always growing. One doesn’t grow if one stays in the same place for a lifetime. Our friend understood that, I know.

But you don’t have to be a world-traveler to understand the world, to be truly a part of it. Rather, you must be open to the world around you, wherever you are. You must be ready to see new faces, listen to new voices, smell and taste the morsels of life.

Living is so much more than just breathing in and breathing out.

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