Thursday, July 7, 2011

Life is What You Make It

     Are people born to stop and smell the roses, or are there only certain people like that?  That’s what I wondered this morning as I looked out the back window and saw my oldest sitting in the grass.  As I examined her I realized that she was playing with something so I continued to watch her.  She had a butterfly and was playfully catching it and letting it go.  She would stop and hold him and study his wings with admiration in her eyes.  She is a stop and smell the roses kind of person.



     I try to remember if I was ever one of those people.  For as long as I know I have been in a hurry.  A hurry to get to the store, a hurry to get to church, a hurry to get home, hurry, hurry, hurry.  If this daughter asks me to stop to pet a baby horse at a fence, or stay a little longer at the milk farm, I always do.  I still sometimes feel that urge to hurry, but because she is this way and because of my love for her I am able to see things as she does.  Even if it’s only for the time being, I see it.  I like what I see.
     Society has taught us that to be a success in life you have to hurry.  You have to be the first one to achieve.  The early bird gets the worm, and if you miss that worm, you’ll never amount to anything.  Is there another way?  I think that in all of the rushing around in life that millions of us are missing actual life.  Isn’t life the beauty and the once in a lifetime sights?  Isn’t life the infectiousness of a baby’s smiles, the hugs between long lost loved ones, the sunsets, the pretty drawing that a child made just for you?  Life happens when in that one moment there is no other alternative but to stop and live in it, fully aware.  That’s life.



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