I know a lot of people who would tell me that reflecting on five and a half decades is too early. But I knew even more that would tell me not to wait. The old saying that had I known I would have lived this long I would have taken better care of myself doesn’t hold here. I’m not in bad shape. Granted, I’m not in a shape that one would strive for, but it’s not someting you would gripe about if it were thrust upon you as it was me.

I fully intend to live a lot longer. Note, I didn’t say I’m planning to live a lot longer because that’s not something over which one  has full control. Let’s just say I’l do my part toward that end.

A score and a half ago I exhibited all the symptoms of harboring a death wish. There was little I wouldn’t try to experience physically be it bareback horseback riding, hang gliding or jumping out of a perfectly good airplane. In fact, I’ve already checked everything off my bucket list, so I’ve had to empty the bucket and start over.

So when I reflect on the fifty-five candles there is only one single moment of my life when I knew what it meant to be alive: love. That single moment is repeated over and over until I’ve lost count. I have seen beneath the bottom and glimpsed the top, had plenty and experienced want, knew stress and worry, shared joy and celebration. Yet no other emotion can muster the power of that single, not necessarily voiced “I love you.”

I’ve lost love on many occassions. I have witnessed the inevitable mortality of some blessed people who have truly loved me. I shivered from the loss of their warmth and felt alone and unloved. In my selfish state I bemoaned the lost opportunities to love them again and receive love in return. But I was never really alone. One who loves is never without the love of others.

Great rejoicing always accompanies new love found. It seems sweeter and more satisfying. In actuality it isn’t. True love is always the same – wonderful, but we constantly amaze ourselves with the capacity fo accommodate new love.

And while love always continues to grow it can be quieted easily by other louder emotions deafening our hearts from hearing the whisper of love. We often invite the din convinced that we know better when we really don’t.

Love will conquer all. It is all you need. However, facilitating the rotation of a planet on its axis might well be outside the realm of love, but it sure makes life better, in fact, makes it liveable at all.

I cannot count a single accomplishment of which I am more proud than my capcity to love. Awards, summons, achievements, failures all seem so fleeting. The only thing I ever want to be remembered for is that I loved you.

Dang, is this what happens to us fogeys when we reach this point? We start to get all drippy, sappy with letters about love? Yes, this is the sum total of a human being. It didn’t take 55 years for me to figure this out, just to finally say it out loud.

• Grape snowcones and choices
• Brown does Halloween

Categories: What was I thinking?