They say time flies when you are having fun and if that’s the case I must be having some major kind of fun. Last night I was relaxing with my girlfriend and all of a sudden I realized that this weekend I’ll hit the two year anniversary of my relapse, which is July 20th. It seems that I have some kind of milestone or anniversary of a significant date in my life for every month. I guess that’s not so unrealistic when you’ve had a 4-5 year period like I’ve had… or maybe that’s the case for everyone.
Two years ago on this date I was in Calgary with a buddy having a fantastic time at the Calgary Stampede. I am still amazed at how much fun I had, how much going I was doing and how I didn’t get sick until my last day there. Since learning about my Leukemia relapse that summer of 2001 I have kind of felt that the Universe was giving me one last week of fun before presenting me with this next major Challenge and putting me back to “work”.
Just as I’m approaching this relapse anniversary I have just past the 5 year anniversary of my graduation from university and in June I was 10 years out of high school. 10 years out of high school with a reunion coming at Xmas that is a little crazy. And then as I say that, if I switch my mind set a little and look at all the things that have happened since high school I wonder how I packed it all into 10 years.
At the beginning of this summer I had an idea for a summer activity with RealTime Cancer which would be called “Movies with a Message”. Essentially what we were going to do is have midnight movies that would be carefully selected for the messages they communicate, I would speak to the audience about my interpretation of the movie and then we’d watch the movie. I still love the idea and we’ll most definitely bring it to life in some form or fashion in the not too distant future.
One of the first movies I thought of is one that I have quoted to you all before… Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, when Ferris says “life moves pretty fast, if you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” Such a great thought from a kid who appeared to be on the “wrong” track in many eyes but for my money he had a pretty solid perspective. If you haven’t seen the movie I encourage you to put on your high school hat and watch it.
10 years out of high school, 5 out of university and working on 2 since my relapse diagnosis. You’ll have to forgive me if I stay with this reflective frame of mind for the next month or so. It seems to happen in July and August pretty consistently since my Intensive Care Unit stay in the summer of 1999.
I do really feel it’s important to look back, reflect on the road you have traveled, remember those you shared it with, have a look at the road ahead, wondering how it might be and giving thought to what you want to create and then bringing your attention back to present, taking the lessons learned from the past and working towards the goals for the future one step at a time, today.
Hope you followed that. Count on me sharing my lessons learned from yesterday, my desires for tomorrow and how they both influence today. Have a great Monday.
Always…
Live life. Love life.
Geoff
