Banquet Without Price

I know people who try to live in the past. Whether their future appears too bleak or they are afraid and worried about what is to come, they merely relive "the old days" and forget to live today. Others live only in the future. Their lives are a long string of destinations and disappointments. They forget to live the journey from now to the next now, building sun castles in the sky. When the clouds come, and bring rain instead of blue skies, their castles fall and they despair that life is unfair. 

I know these people, because at various times in my own life, I was "these people." The gift of living one day at a time came with my diagnosis of leukemia. I am alive and intend to remain so as long as God grants me the gift of a new day, each day. The sure knowledge that each day could be my last is a strong motivation to pack as much living into each day as possible. Worrying about tomorrow or fretting about the past change nothing. Each new day is a banquet without price, and I plan to dig in and enjoy.

Mick

Banquet Without Price

I tried to live in the future, did I;

A wonderful and unlimited place,

Where sick people do not suddenly die,

And ev'ry competitor wins each race.

There is always enough to go around,

And no one ever gets angry or sad.

Laughter and happiness, the only sound

One can hear, for nothing ever goes bad.

And yet, like trying to live in the past,

A dead time, where nothing can ever change;

The fluid dreams of the future don't last,

And life there's impossible to arrange.

Feast on the past, add the future as spice,

For today is the banquet without price.

Mick McKellar

June 2011