It Isn't Yours To Keep.

Time for you to do some work. I need you to cast your mind to a time, a moment when you were at one with the universe. When everything slipped into place, when it couldn't have gone any better. Perhaps it was with someone special? Or somewhere special? Doesn't matter. You'll know what I'm talking about.
You there yet? Don't rush this, spare the time to reflect and recall what made it what it was. We probably all agree that these events are relatively rare; we spend so much of our lives dancing to the tune of others. But when they happen, when it all clicks it evokes a feeling, a sense of being alive that doesn't occur at any other time. Now I'm having one of these episodes; or one of those weeks to be precise. I'm in the Lake District. Our days have been perfect. They haven't missed a beat. Joy and I are as into each other as we've ever been, which isn't bad after 16 years. And the girls; oh those girls have been a delight from dusk until dawn. The natural world is astonishing around us, whilst our home feels like, well, actually our home. We've climbed mountains, explored forests, walked besides lakes and through meadows and alongside rivers that look like they belong in Middle Earth. So it's been idyllic, but it's nearly done. By the time many of you read this we will be homeward bound, normality hurtling towards us like the unstoppable force it is. But that's ok, because we've had this time, these moments, and my soul is warmed. But now to the point of this thing; I'm so aware that when these transient wonders present themselves they need to be enjoyed as the precious gems they are. Handled, appreciated, but then permitted to leave without begrudging their departure. More than that, never, and I mean never try to recapture a moment that has passed. Nor a feeling, or a time. Because time is a thief and it will not, cannot return what it has claimed from you. So none of us should hanker after that which has gone, that which can never be revisited. Imagine if you will as living your life in the glow of a slowly moving torch, the light illuminating only the present, leaving our history in darkness, and our future a mystery. You, I, we live in this moment. We live in the here and now, and it's in the here and now that we must dwell, and focus our energies and our passions. Try not to mourn what has gone, and try not to live as if your life is going to start at some point in the future, when you've done this thing, that thing. The now is where we get our business done, and where are heads need to be. To do otherwise is to cheat ourselves of the moments we have.
I am a deeply fortunate man. I am loved, I have comfort and some semblance of wealth. I take none of these things for granted and hold all fortune, good or ill, as lightly as I can. But this much I know; tomorrow is a day of possibilities, and I'll never get to live it again, so if it's all the same to you I'll neither linger in the past nor await the future with indolence. That would be a crime, a crime against myself, against the time you have, I have. And I don't want to make that mistake.