Smell the Flowers

I wanted to write something funny today, a sort of comic relief.  Something lighthearted, pointing out the idiosyncrasies of my regulars.  Anything at all, but that's not where my mind is at this moment.

This week I almost lost my younger brother.  The strong, healthy boy who never gets sick suddenly became profoundly ill-- ill to the point that if he had decided to forego seeking medical help and had chosen to sleep off his pain instead, he would not have woken up.

 

I tried my hardest to recall the last meaningful conversation he and I shared...and shamefully, I couldn't.  We had both become so engrossed in living our separate lives. We had grown up, and in growing up-- apart.

It hit me that in just a fleeting moment, I would not have had him in my life.  It hit me that I'm also not as close with him as we were growing up.  The sudden realization made me sick...that I simply do not tell him enough how much I love him.

We live our lives in a constant rush.  A race to make money-- to get ahead.  We break our backs to achieve our grand scheme of success.  More often times than not, it is one very skewed ideology of success we are after in the first place.

We spend years of burying our heads in the pages of books to obtain a paper that we are told, promises us a better future.  We work because we have to;  it is what responsible adults do, even if this means working at a job we don't love which then leaves us empty and unfulfilled.  We entrap ourselves in some semblance of a social circle.  Congregate at the same watering holes with all of the usual suspects.  This is the monotony of our lives we grow accustomed to.  A cycle we have become familiar with.  A steadily beating drum that allows us to march forward, yet not always onward in progress.  We even at times become lost in the madness.  



Regretfully, we do not take the time to stop and smell the flowers-- the same ones we have been unwittingly passing by all along.  So call up your family.  Say hello to your siblings.  Yes, even the ones you may not get along with.  Hug your parents.  Don't be afraid to return to your roots.

It is a fact of life;  no one lives forever.  But wouldn't it be a shame if you did not appreciate the beauty of a life until it was too late?

--Malia Etienette

Photo Credit:
Kids on a dock- www.elyresorts.com
Stop and Smell the Flowers- www.mikeblockerspeaks.com