Friday, September 12, 2008
Perspective
It's T minus 59 hours until I take off and, for the very first time, I am experiencing a tinge of anxiousness about leaving. This is no brief getaway. I will be gone for three whole months. I started questioning whether perhaps I'm being a bit brazen. Couldn't I have seen enough in, say, three weeks? Shouldn't I be back home working, contributing to my 401(K) and advancing my career instead of globetrotting? Yeah, probably. However, as a very wise person pointed out to me, I have the rest of my life to be responsible. Life is so very short. I feel like I'm constantly being reminded of this. Not to be too macabre, but I could get hit by a car tomorrow or find out I have some inoperable brain tumor and have three months to live. The point is, I do have the rest of my life to be responsible. I've heard it said that, in the end, what people regret most is not what they've done, but rather what they didn't do. In the grand scheme of things, three months is nothing and it would be irresponsible for me not to recognize that.
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1 comment:
This is a very late comment- the last few months have been a little hectic. We both know this now, but you could not have picked a better time to NOT be dumping money into a stock market based fund, and prices for travel and consumers have been headed nicely lower lately. Besides, as you say, the regrets one looks back on are the things you didn't say, didn't do, opportunities that slipped away, etc. So in my book, you made a great decision. And in this day, some direct American contact to people of other parts of the world is a good thing. You are doing your own part to dissuade people that we are all scary and militant and rude at best.
Missed you at Eric's wedding by the way. I thought of you, but knew you were on your adventure. I made it back from Iraq about 5 days before the wedding.
You take care and give yourself a big hug from me...
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