A friend and I were discussing the stuff we had done over our lifetime. He commented on a polo trophy I had and how it must be great to have the trophy. I told him “You will always remember the ride long after you have lost the trophy buckle.”

I cannot take credit for that bit of wisdom because it came from a saddle bronc rider I knew in Wyoming. He actually said “Yea, the wife keeps the trophies in a closet and reuses them for little league games. I always have the memories and they never go away, and they get better every time I tell the story.”

Life is a magic gift, and it gets better if you create memories to share with old, and new, friends over coffee, beer, or just sitting playing music.

I have told many young people “Do not live to age 65 and find yourself saying ‘If I had only…’ ” It does not have to be a big adventure like seeing the Antarctic, or racing in Milan. It can be just getting some friends together and going to the beach to see the sunset. Or, going to a restaurant you have never been to and trying a food you might never eat again.

It might go like this. “Remember that time we all went to the raw fish place and Diane got sick and heaved up octopus all over the Dave’s dash?” It will be much better when you retell it than when it was going on.

The point here is that life happens, if you participate or not, and being part of all the amazing things going on in the world makes it so much better.

And consider this! If you don’t have any stories to tell when you get older, you have to sit in the hall at the home and just wait for the staff to change your sheets. If you have stories to share, you can go to the café, and BS with anybody there.

So, trophies are OK but when your kids take them all to Goodwill, or an estate sale, the memories of those events never go away. And… you get to be even braver and more glorious when you retell the story.

Life is too short to do everything so try not to waste it.
(And never pass up an opportunity to be silly!)