Remember to Live

Life by AdonisWerther
Image source: Life by AdonisWerther

A month ago, when I originally searched for her name, I knew she would be gone. Even with that thought, it saddened me more than I expected. I sat in shock for a while after having first read the obituary.

She did a lot with her life. I'm happy for her about that.

They say that you start to see your own mortality when your friends die. I never understood why. I do now.

When I read that a celebrity dies, I don't really care. They're not really "people" to me. They are so far removed from my life that their deaths quickly become just some factoid for some shitty online list somewhere. I didn't know them, and they didn't know me.

I read how they did a lot in their lives. Of course they did. They had all the money and clout that they needed to do whatever they wanted. How would I relate to that? "They were taken too soon." No, they weren't. They did more with their lives than I ever will. If they were taken "too soon," then the rest of us are taken when we're practically fetal.

Then, I read her obituary. This is a person who I knew, who I grew up with. She had a similar background to me and lived in the same time as me. She was as smart as me. She liked the same things as me. She had the same amount of money as me.

She did things with her life. I haven't. With her, I have no excuses. She traveled the world, made friends, and did what she loved. She was in her mid-twenties when she did. Even though she may have lived a more full life than I have so far, it could have been more full. She was taken "too soon."

A month ago, I thought to do better. I would become more fit. I would stop procrastinating. I would do what I keep imagining myself doing rather than watching TV and regretting another night wasted.

It's been a month, and nothing is different. I am not different. In one month, I've already forgotten to care about my own life again.

That is the key difference between me and someone who lives their life to the fullest: remembering that you want to live and that one day, you won't be able to put that off anymore.