For over 50 years, we’ve walked life side by side.
Pause. Think. Be thankful.
That’s something to shout about!
But now we are stepping into those last months before the next significant decade.
Next Year. Seventy will no longer be on the horizon.
It blazes on the scene in the first month of the following year.
Life’s average age, according to those who count beans,
He says that each of us will pass somewhere in our mid-70s.
It’s different for women and men, black, brown, white, USA or another country.
In other words, there’s no telling when or where, but we must all face the inevitable.
Being said, written, and thought about, I’ve determined,
We’ve enough income to last until living costs drive us out of our homes.
But how do we live longer?
I’m glad you asked. Stay Fresh. Stay True.
Staying Fresh
Exercise, right eating, keeping the body and mind under subjection to what’s needed more than what’s wanted. Look at the smorgasbord and say, I’ll only have what sustains me how I want to be sustained.
This doesn’t mean I keep looking for everything “new” but to know what it’s “fresh” for me. I’m perfectly content reading older books instead of the latest and greatest phenom on the scene. Eventually, new books go on sale and I’ll enjoy them for pennies instead of dollars.
Learning to make do with what you have instead of spending energy and money on the latest and greatest. What? It means making your world stretch. When it approachs limits, then you consider what the next step should be.
On one hand it’s about control. On the flip side? Knowing my limits.
My 21-year-old Dodge pickup has 369k miles and has spent about 5,000 on repairs over the intervening years, giving me a promise of 1 million miles. However, my needs may change, so I keep my options open.
I have a garden tool (pictured) my granddad fixed up for my grandmother when they were in their ’80s. The tool head is rusty, the original wood handle was broken. From a branch, he fashioned a handle! No sense spending on something new when you can make do with what you have.
I have a garden tool (pictured) my granddad fixed up for my grandmother when they were in their ’80s. The tool head is rusty, the original wood handle was broken. From a branch, he fashioned a handle! No sense spending on something new when you can make do with what you have.
Yes. That’s a fresh approach in this planned obsolesce society we find ourselves living in.
Stay True
I did a quick calculation at www.timeanddate.com
From the day we said, “I do” until this particular moment of time.
Result: 18,306 days
Or 50 years, 1 month, 12 days including the end date.
Or 601 month, 12 days including the end date.
Or 1,581,638,400 seconds
Or 26,360,640 minutes
Or 439,344 hours
Or 2615 weeks and 1 day
Staying true, at least for me, means not worrying about the time span, but knowing you will never let down your guard for a distraction that will break the covenant of Love.
Yes. An aunt told me we married too young. “Wait until after college. You change a lot between now and then.” True. But I can still love the one I want after college and career that I started loving when in High School. Of course, I didn’t finish college until later in life so what she said didn’t affect me!
As we age, love doesn’t fade. It just keeps getting deeper!
Integrity
I suspect I’m no different from anyone else.
In the heat or in an emotional moment,
I can slip and fall.
Life will change.
I’ll have to start over.
But there are not enough years for the same.
I’ve shared a lot through the years, including my take on Psalms 26.
It’s all about Integrity. [Click to read.]
If you build on it, you are sustained.
If you have no clue what it is,
You’ll dance through life with no rudder or anchor.
David says, I have walked, and I will walk,
In my integrity. Past. Future.
But then he describes his present.
If you had it in the past, and intend on it being there in the future,
Then you must be walking in your integrity right now.
Stay Fresh. Stay True. But continue walking the way you know you should go.