Midlife Euphoria Day 12

Midlife Euphoria Day 13

The older I get, the more I enjoy Saturday morning. Perhaps it's the quiet solitude that comes with being the first to rise, or maybe it's the unbounded joy of not having to be at work. Either way, the first few hours of a Saturday morning are most enjoyable.
A few weeks ago, I was shuffling toward the computer with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and the morning paper in the other. What began as a typical Saturday morning turned into one of those lessons that life seems to hand you from time to time. Let me tell you about it:
I turned the internet and checked my mail.  A friend had sent me a “forward” THE STORY OF A 1000 MARBLES
I was intrigued and clicked on it to read what it said.
The acumen I gathered from it stays with me till date.
 Let me share the excerpt with you. I hope that it brings about a similar realization to all who read it.

Conversation between an anchor and a guest on a radio talk show:
"Well, Tom, it sure sounds like you're busy with your job. I'm sure they pay you well but it's a shame you have to be away from home and your family so much. Hard to believe a young fellow should have to work sixty or seventy hours a week to make ends meet. It's too bad you missed your daughter's dance recital," he continued; "Let me tell you something that has helped me keep my own priorities." And that's when he began to explain his theory of a "thousand marbles."
"You see, I sat down one day and did a little arithmetic. The average person lives about seventy-five years. I know, some live more and some live less, but on average, folks live about seventy-five years.
Now then, I multiplied 75 times 52 and I came up with 3,900, which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has in their entire lifetime. Now, stick with me, Tom, I'm getting to the important part.
It took me until I was fifty-five years old to think about all this in any detail," he went on, "and by that time I had lived through over twenty-eight hundred Saturdays. I got to thinking that if I lived to be seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them left to enjoy. So I went to a toy store and bought every single marble they had. I ended up having to visit three toy stores to round up 1,000 marbles. I took them home and put them inside a large, clear plastic container right here in the shack next to my gear.
Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out and thrown it away. I found that by watching the marbles diminish, I focused more on the really important things in life.
There's nothing like watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight.
Now let me tell you one last thing before I sign off with you and take my lovely wife out for breakfast. This morning, I took the very last marble out of the container. I figure that if I make it until next Saturday then I have been given a little extra time. And the one thing we can all use is a little more time.
It was nice to meet you Tom. I hope you spend more time with your family, and I hope to meet you again here on the band. This is a 75 year old man, K9NZQ, clear and going QRT, good morning!"
This little piece touched a chord in my heart.  He gave me a lot to think about. His philosophy was so simple yet so true. Very often we neglect to do the most important and obvious things although they are almost effortless and entirely within our power to accomplish
I had planned to work on cleaning my cupboard that morning, and then I was going to meet up with the housing society members to work on the next community program.
Instead, I went to the study where my husband was sipping his coffee and said, "C'mon take me out for brunch today"

"What brought this on?" he asked with a smile.
"Oh, nothing special, it's just been a long time since we spent a Saturday together, just the two of us.” And hey, can we stop at a toy store while we're out? I need to buy some marbles."