That one moment you never forget

I love the movie "Hitch" and I've watched it probably too many times.  I love the message that we should live life to the fullest. Sure, its a cliché we've all heard in twenty variations, but that doesn't mean we understand or get it. Take time to smell the roses.  Most of us know that one and we still don't do it, because we don't comprehend how incredible and fabulous living like this can be.

I listened to my bride tell me something the other day and I don't think it was anything earth shaking, but I looked at her face and how animated she was and I stopped her and told her how much I love her. Yea, I was right where I wanted to be. I had a deep understanding of just how important she is to me and how fortunate I am to have her in my life.

Years ago, a few Airmen and I were camping in the mountains of Montana. There was a lone bald peak not too far from our tents and I told them I was going to climb it. "Why?" they all echoed. "I want to experience it," was my reply and one by one they rose and we made the steep climb. As we sat at the top and looked around, we shared that experience and were in no hurry to leave. Now 40 years later I can revisit that peak because I absorbed it.

Do you ever wonder why people take vacations and cruises but never talk about them afterward? I wonder if they slowed down enough to let it soak into the fabric of their being? If you ask them, they will swear they did and maybe tell you how they swam with great white sharks or zip-lined through an active volcano and then they fall silent or change the subject. Did they truly experience that moment, or was it just another cheap thrill and a check mark on their bucket list? Truly amazing moments often happen in truly unamazing places and you never forget them. Make a note I am excluding tragedy from this line of thought.

I was in Midtown instructing an 0530 spin class and we were cycling in a near dark spin room, crowded with stationary bikes and sweating people. Believe it or not, I am often down there at Elgin and Louisiana, as they need instructors and I leave Baytown at 0420 to get there and get set up for class. Most all of these people work in offices and will leave the gym and go to work. Me? I am living and doing exactly what I want at that moment. I love it.

I often adjure them to be selfish with their hour of exertion. "Don't go to work in your head before your body has to. This is your hour to be selfish. You are not going to change a thing over there right now. You are here because there is no other place you want to be, so don't mentally leave. forget the TPS reports, your bills, the kids, forget everything but this bike and the mountain trail you are riding. Right now its just you, your body, and this bike," and then I tell them a corny joke. I often explain that their body will tell them to stop, but all they need to do is live in the moment and like one man told me after a class, "I've been spinning for 6 years and that was the hardest class I've ever been in."

I laughed because I didn't push him that hard - he somehow plugged in and pushed himself to new level and that should be our goal. Do we have to water ski behind a 900 foot ocean liner or wrestle a 26 foot long Nile croc to have an awakening?  Of course not. This moment will come at a most unexpected time of revelation. It may take place in a parking lot when you see a cloud formation, or talk to a lady in a supermarket. For that instant you realize why you are here and looking around you decide there is no place on earth like the one you are experiencing. You are living in the moment.

I stand in my driveway at night and look at the planet Venus and little red Mars and then the moon and I am as happy as a chimp with a banana. I know my bride is not interested in the view, but I am seeing the collective of millions of stargazers and I feel their connection. My Chinese Holly tree's berries are feeding the migrating cedar wax-wing birds and I can feel a satisfaction that stays with me all day and all I have to do is take time to watch them.

Living in the moment is far more than a tag line from a movie. It is a realization that there is no place on earth better than the one you are experiencing right now.

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The Sun Rises Every Day

This past Saturday, I arrived at the Baytown Nature Center right at 7am just minutes before the sun peeked over the horizon and after chatting with the bubbly attendant, drove my Jeep down to the raised pavilion in back.  It is one of the few places you can go here on the flat Texas Gulf Coast and get a wonderful panoramic view.  I was excited and anxious to see another heavenly sunrise and this one promised to be a beauty.

The invigorating effect of the clean air and cool temperature washing over me was multiplied by a 20 mile per hour north wind and I was glad I had my Nomex hoodie with me.  I came to teach a geocaching 101 class along with two friends Larry Houston and Julie Denton, but Larry was laid up in San Jacinto Methodist awaiting a treatment for a sudden ailment. 

As I pulled up on the west side of the pavilion, I took this breath-taking beautiful photo to share and although modern digital cameras are a marvel, they are no match for what all of us see with the naked eye, or what I facetiously like to say, as the naked observer.  I am the kind of person that likes to be early to everything.  I am also the kind of person who likes to be first.  On this day, I was both and unloading my teaching paraphernalia, I carried it up to the top of this amazing wheel-chair accessible teaching location.

On my way there, I stopped at the Donut Wheel on Garth Road and bought donuts – 18 to be exact, as others were sure to bring much more and did.  While there, the Vietnamese fellow who runs the place and I had an amicable chat about obesity, diabetes, and cholesterol, of all things and being a man who has lived in South East Asia, I like to pick the brains of Asians every chance I get.  He told me his homeland is suffering from the same health problems concerning diet as we Texans, in that air-conditioning and modern conveniences are replacing hard work, so diseases like diabetes are becoming common.

We settled on a dozen mixed and 6 cake donuts, as everyone knows the cake donuts are the only safe choice.  I ate two after arriving along with a hot coal-black cuppa Joe. 

Setting up my props in the pavilion, I stopped to watch the sun fully appear over the heavily industrialized horizon and being a denizen of the concrete and steel jungle for close to 40 years, I found it exceedingly beautiful.  I’ve learned to see it that way, as years ago I made up my mind to enjoy my life regardless of where I was.  When a person averages 15 to 16 months of work in a year’s time for most of their adult life, they better learn how to do this, or they will spend 90% of their waking hours wishing they were somewhere else.

Ruminate on that last statement.

I want to live in the moment and yes, I know this cliché is over-used.  However, it is a lesson most of us haven’t learned and that is the crux of this column.  Have you ever stood alone and looked at something and wished there were someone there to witness or share the wonder you are observing?  Whether you realize it or not, you are living in the moment.

Last week before the heavy rain came, I was at work and I stepped out of the back of the control room and there in the clouds was a very faint rainbow.  It was in an odd place and not where I would expect to see such a phenomenon.  I enjoyed it for all of a minute and it faded.  Questioning folks throughout the day, evidentially no one saw it but me. 

One by one students and seasoned geocachers began to arrive at the pavilion and before long there was a very large group of us eating donuts, laughing, sharing stories about challenging geocaches, and sharing trackable items.  Geocachers have these items called pathtags, Geocoins, and travelbugs and they have trackable numbers on them, so when one of these items moves from one “cache” to another, the miles are calculated.  At this class there were 4 geocachers with trackable numbers tattooed on their bodies.  Incredible.  They are human trackable items and I photographed their tats so I could log the numbers when I got home.  We were in the moment.  I knew it, but I wonder how many of us knew?

After the class, which lasted 2 fun hours, we loaded up everything and moved down to the Nurture Nature Festival and set up our booth under a tent.  I was joined by two other geocachers whose monikers are Juleed and Greeneyed and we sat, ate, and passed out donuts, stamped passports, and offered geocaching tips and information to the many people who visited out station.  The wind was something else, but you know?  We had a great time.  We were in the moment.