My posting has been slightly delayed because we experienced a loss yesterday. Duncan, one of our beloved cats died. He'd been ill for a while and it finally claimed him. We buried him on a hill at the edge of the property where another cat had been buried. Since the site was now officially a cemetery, I went hunting for stones and built cairns for both of them.
This is a valuable reminder of how we must treasure every day we have. Duncan was one of a litter of three and the only one of them that made it to adulthood. A genetic defect caused his two brothers to die, and he only barely survived. That defect, however, is what eventually claimed him.
Duncan stands as a reminder to me of how frail and short our lives can be. Before too long, every one of you alive to read this will be dead. For some it'll be forty years, for others sixty, or if you're young and living a healthy life you may just be regaling this story to your great great grandchildren a hundred years from now. But you'll still die eventually.
This is why we must live for today. Planning for the future is fine, as a matter of fact I highly recommend it. But, don't let your plans for the future cause you to waste today. Embrace the moment, take joy in the small things. Life's too short for petty things like rivalries and grudges. Life's too frail for politics and he-said-she-said.
Life is something we only get one of, and when we leave it, we're leaving our descendants with lives of their own to experience, so stop worrying about what everyone else is doing, and just worry about you. So long as you're doing the right thing, so long as you're living up every moment, and so long as you're doing your species and your family proud, the actions and the emotions of others are nothing but fluffy clouds, brushing past as you soar.
“Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones.”
Marcus Aurelius
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