I hope that everyone had a good summer. The coming of cool weather this past weekend reminded me of the fast approaching holidays and how fast a year goes by. I had taken my girls to Maple View Dairy, which is about 20 miles down the road from my home,on the old Subaru.
Maple View is a place that has some of the freshest homemade ice cream around. It is a dairy farm that produces fresh milk stored in glass bottles and ice cream. It has a country store on site where we get ice cream in homemade waffle cones and rock the day away. As we licked our cones while sitting in the wooden rocking chairs on the store's front porch I had time for reflection. My oldest brother died 2 years ago right after retirement. There was a twenty year gap between us but we were close even though we were at odds sometimes. One of his biggest regrets that he shared with me before he got sick was that he gave too many things priority ahead of his kids. There were few photos of him and the kids because he was always too busy for them. He told me this before he passed as advice of what not to do. He and his wife had divorced and he had relegated the responsibility of raising the kids to her. He missed the important ball games and school programs and took trips with his buddies instead of with the kids. I did not share with him that we(siblings) all knew of his future regrets before he but at the time he would not have listened. He was a good man but kept the ones close to him at arms length.
That day of reflection got me to thinking how most of us work all our lives putting in long hours to provide our families with necessities and wants. Along the way, the job makes us believe how invaluable we are to the company so, we spend more time on the job and less at home. Our kids grow so fast; one minute just learning to walk and the next walking across the college graduation stage. Through the years we move up the corporate ladder and hear things like "Tom, I don't know what this company would do without you." This makes us feel good when we think about the games that we never saw Junior or Susan play in over the years. Then one day after 25 or 30 years you retire and get that gold watch. After 3 years of retirement you go by the old job and run into new faces who have no idea you ever treaded those halls. In 10 or 15 years your name will not even register in the personnel files. Your Legacy is gone and you wonder, will anyone ever know 50 years from now that you were here and your life mattered. As you rummage through photo albums looking back over your life hopefully you will find pictures of the Legacy you created with your children for it is they and theirs who will carry it on through stories and tales for generations to come. I know for myself as I sat on that porch, I thanked God for the blessings of my kids and the wisdom to know that they are blessings in my life. I remember when the first one was born I held her in my arms overwhelmed with joy. I looked at my wife and child and they made me want to be a better man. That day I made a promise that when I died my girls would never wonder if or how much I loved them because they would by my actions each and every day. So as the time of season for families and friends swiftly approaches, slow down a weekend or two and drive down an old country road in no particular hurry, and get your own ice cream cone so that you may have your own time for reflection.
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