Just five days
By PAT WICK
© Another Day in the Country
Perhaps all this was brought on by the fact that we'd been reading the new book, "Five People You Meet in Heaven," that was given to Jess as a Christmas gift. (The book, in our opinion, just in case you wanted a review, starts out splendidly but then meanders off somewhere.) Nonetheless, it started us talking. Here we have a whole year stretching out in front of us and yesterday as we drove to Salina to do errands we started talking about how days seem to slip through your fingers so quickly. A week goes by — ffffttt. A month is gone and then a year!
We used to play this game on birthdays and New Year's, as we reviewed the year, asking ourselves, "If you had one year to live, what would you do?" In fact, the answer to that question, as many of you already know, is what brought me back to Ramona.
Yesterday we increased the ante and said to each other, "If you had five days to live, what would you do?" Since it's pretty cold in the country right now, I said, for starters that I would head for some tropical beach! At the moment my toes are freezing and I love thinking about hot sun and warm sand and bathtub-temperature ocean water. Jess agreed, "I'd go diving," she said.
Since we were heading for a restaurant, we also talked food. "I'd go to a different high quality restaurant every meal," said my sister. "I'd cook at home," I said. "One meal we'd have sauerkraut and mashed potatoes, another meal — pot pie, then roast." You can tell we were hungry. "I'd make a different cheesecake for dessert every day," said Jessica. "I'd want Marlene's cherry pie with vanilla ice cream one day," I interjected. And, I'd have a massage every day, I added. "I'd film those last five days with our fancy new camera that we got for Christmas and then on day #5 we'd edit it — for posterity."
"What about you?" we asked Tooltime Tim, who'd been sitting through all this in silence. "I don't think about it," he said with finality. "Ah, c'mon," we pleaded. "Nope," he said. We were at the restaurant now, and he headed for the grill.
Whether or not TTT likes to dwell on it, we love playing the game and continued all through our meal, deciding how we'd spend 120 hours and who we'd like to spend the time with.
When we'd exhausted our five days, we sat back and contemplated the new year. During this next week we have a chance at much more than 120 hours. Will we just do the same old thing, forgetting all those things we said we'd do if we knew our time was severely limited?
It's another day in the country — I vowed to include as many of those things as possible that I'd mentioned in our next five days. For instance, we're having roast for dinner today with cabbage and potatoes, carrots and onions. Later, I'll have that massage. And for now, I'll settle for a warm wheat sock at my toes when I crawl into bed and just dream about sun-drenched tropical beaches.
