I recently read about a woman who
conducts workshops on how to write your own obituary. The responses to her
workshop always seem go one of two ways. The first group wrinkles their nose
and responds with a frown “Oh, Lord, I don’t want to talk about my own death.”
The more optimistic of that group then adds “and besides, I’m never going to
die.” It’s denial at its most optimistic stance.
The second group recognizes that these
workshops are an opportunity to make their own farewell statement. These folks
realize that they now have an opportunity to say just what they want to say
about their own lives instead of it coming from some boiler-plate funeral home ad
or a template from the newspaper. They get to share with family, friends, and
associates just what was important to them and what they are most proud of for
the time they spent here on earth.
I’m in that second group. I want
to tell the world what I did with my life…once I figure it out.
At first blush I’d have to say
I’ve been very lucky on so many levels. Then having said that I would also add
that I’m unapologetic for past failures, mistakes, losses, missed opportunities
and a wide assortment of sundry missteps that have also defined my life. At
this stage of the game, I’m too old and too busy to worry about ‘what might
have been’ or ‘what if’ or ‘if only...’
I guess my own story begins with
a French-Canadian guy whose parents came from someplace in Canada. He was a short
guy with a pencil-thin mustache and (supposedly) a fondness for the drink. He
went from Michigan and ended up in the Twin Cities. He was playing in a band in
St. Cloud, Minnesota when he met my mother. She was just a young German
Catholic girl recently off the farm.
So, my heritage is French
Canadian and German. But what does that mean in the greater scheme of things?
It is a heritage that I have no affinity to nor interest in…because it has no
roots. As was befitting the rural German Catholic culture of that time, my
mother never spoke of my father either before or after he passed away. It was
as if he never existed in the first place.
I can lay out a few of the stats,
facts and incidents that defined who I became. I was young and dumb and poor
but open and honest. I’d like to believe that, much like my writing, I stumbled
a lot but somehow kept moving forward.
I can talk about those men and
women who briefly had an impactful influence on my life. I can talk about working
from 7th grade on and usually having two jobs going on
simultaneously. I can talk about twenty plus years of working full time,
running my business and managing several apartment buildings all at the same
time. I can talk about near burn out and finally redemption on long bike rides,
torturous trail runs and sojourns into the high desert.
It’s always a challenge to
revisit that narrative in my head about my life up to a certain point. The
facts are easy to lie out and document. I could put them into a flow chart or a
neatly outlined diagram that lists important dates in my life. It’s neat and
clean but still smells like an old tattered history book. Something is missing.
The data would tell you how I got to where I am but it wouldn’t tell you how I
ended up being who I am today.
There is a ‘60’s time warp still
safely ensconced in my head. A wonderful period of creativity with its music
and Bob Dylan and the Beatles and hippies and personal liberation and milestones.
I don’t apologize for that. It is part of who I have become. It doesn’t take
away from my life today but instead comforts and feeds me more material for my
stories.
I am not interested in ‘what
if’s.’ Bob Dylan said ‘Don’t look back.’ I would add as a caveat unless you’re
in a good place. Because if you’re in a good place in your life today then you
can look back and see the success and the failure, the goals that fell short
and those never attempted. You can look at your life as it truly was and not as
someone else said it should be.
One friend recently commented to
me that it was too bad I hadn’t started my writing career years earlier. I
simply replied that I couldn’t have done that years ago because I wasn’t the
same person that I am today. My head was in a different place back then.
Neither better nor worse but probably not conducive to the focused passion I
feel for my writing today.
I guess I’m foolish enough to
believe that old cliché that it’s never too late to become the person you’ve
always wanted to be. I am today the result of a million different experiences,
episodes, loves, failures, losses, challenges, and successes that rippled
through my life over the last seventy years.
Awhile back, I read a book called
‘And Then the Vulture Eats You.’ Much like another favorite book of mine, ‘Zen
and the Art of Running’ These authors pointed out that a runner changes
minutely each day and shouldn’t expect the same results today as he might have
gotten last week or last year or ten years ago. Like many others, I am
constantly changing and evolving and adapting to the nuances of each day.
I have another friend who has
defined life in three simple words: Learning, Earning and Yearning. His
position is that we grow up with certain knowledge. We make a living. Then (he
claims) we yearn for what we didn’t do or don’t have or lost. I don’t think it
has to necessarily be that way.
I can’t do nor do I want to do
what I did before. I do not want to wear a younger man’s façade. The years of
experience and joy and disappointment run lines across my face but I wear them
like a seasoned veteran worn by the games of life.
My new identity is a moniker I
wear with pride and is defined by the stories I tell. My blogs are just one
step in that direction. They are personal, explicit, revealing, open and
honest. But in the end, they are simply meant to be a snapshot of a moment in
time in the life of…
Today I am much more interested
in telling my stories and living my life vicariously through my characters. I
want to share the fear of humping my hog through the boonies, riding old Apache
trails and avoiding ambush in some narrow slot canyon. I want to mastermind the
intricate workings of a modern-day courtship and look in on two women slowly
falling in love. I want my protagonist to fall in love with a siren of my own
creation.
I want the new me to splatter my
keyboard with stories of past adventures, mishaps, wondrous experiences, and my
characters grand plans for the future. I want to live the life of a drifter out
west and an adventurer on the Mekong Delta. And I want to do that until my ink
dries up and my mind slowly fades away.
I haven’t written my own obituary
yet but when I do, it’ll probably start with something like…
“He had a good life…and then it
got even better.”