When will it be your last time?
Apr 22, 2024The Last Time…
When will it be your last time?
Has it already been your last time?
Over the weekend I was tidying up the garage…
In this box of old balls was a few score cards…
The first one empty, the second one used…
However this was not any ordinary score card…
It was the LAST time that dad and I played golf together…
Did I know it at the time?
No… but I know it now…
Dad and I shared a lot of games of golf…
We partnered in some tennis and golf combo competitions…
We played some great courses together and he would talk me through every situation and strategy…
Dad was a good golfer…
He achieved a handicap of 4 playing top quality courses…
He achieved that but it was too stressful to maintain and I could see the fun leaving the game for him…
So instead he hovered around a casual 7,8ish for maybe 15 years until his last game…
Anyway golf…
We would joke because he would always encourage me to play with him but understood how I was saving it for my ‘less agile years’…
A mistake… because…
I never realised dad would not be alive to play too…
I didn’t realise what I was actually choosing…
What I wish now…
I wish I had played regularly with dad too… maybe once a month or once every other month…
But I thought I had time…
I thought later was an option…
I never thought any game was going to be my last…
Neither would he…
How many things in our lives have already been our last?
I remember as a child leaving holidays or meeting people really feeling like it was my last…
I would walk around a room and take it all in…
Thank the hotel room, or the destination for being a part of my journey…
I’d just take a moment… a pause and be grateful…
I’d meet people and think, I may never see you again…
So many beautiful things…
But I was present…
The energy was exchanged… I could smell feel and taste the moments…
I then learnt to identify some extra special ones…
Like a little tap on the shoulder…
A voice would whisper ‘you are in one of those moments right now’…
I would press a virtual pause button and take it all in…
All of it… I am and living in a memory right now…
This was especially important back only a few short decades ago..
Before we always have a camera in our pocket and mobile phones and social media to contact people any time…
It is so easy to ‘find’ people again now… maybe we have lost a bit of the magic of the in person…
Maybe these tools have killed that ability to be present and feel the heart strings tug…
When the heart strings hurt… make you feel sad… really sad…
But that feeling of acknowledging the last time brings us to a beautiful place of now…
I have met beautiful people I will never see again…
I also have met beautiful people I thought I would never see again and a magical force changed that…
I have been to amazing places I will never see again…
But with people…
Take a moment…
Be present with people…
Hug, listen, smile…
In person…
Respect each others presence…
Because in the future you may realise it was your last time…
