The Lottery of Life (2)

A few months ago, I blogged about the random nature of life and luck. I thought about this again this week. At the start of the week, an elderly relative died. In the middle of the week, a good friend, roughly my age, was found dead in his flat. And at the end of the week, another relative was killed by a car.

The first death was of someone who was 89 and had been ill. So was not really a surprise nor could really be said to be a tragedy.

But the second person was my age, was someone I had worked with and had not been ill. He had been made redundant from the SouthBank Centre 5 years ago, as had I. Whereas I was lucky to get another job immediately, and had viewed my redundancy as an opportunity to get out of a job I was increasingly hating, he had difficulties getting suitable work and had grown increasingly bitter about the forced redundancy. I do not yet know the circumstances of his death, but it reminds me that, whenever I get a bit down, I am still very fortunate.

To compound the feeling that life is a lottery, the person who told me of that death, also someone of my age, revealed that he has recently been diagnosed with cancer.

And the third death was very ironic in its circumstances. A relative, living in the USA, who had recently retired after 50 years working in the Salvation Army. Someone who was deeply religious. He died when he was hit by a car - in the church car park! Just when he was looking forward to retirement.

On the other side of the coin, over the weekend I was in Ipswich with a group of friends, again most of around my age, and some of whom have been able to retire early with no real worries about money. Someone I played tennis with last week, has a new expensive car and a huge house.

So what is the lesson of all of this? I suppose it is one of acceptance of the cards which life has dealt, keeping envy at bay when others seem to have been dealt a better hand, but awareness that still others were dealt much worse hands.

Ths breeds a determination to make the best of the hand one has. I want to live the rest of my life as best I can, and as energetically as I can, being friendly and supportive to others, always wanting to learn and experience more of life, being able to give and receive love, planning for the future but not being constrained by the planning process. And trying to help those who need my help, whilst still forging out a unique path for myself.

Wow. That all sounds a bit serious, a bit restrictive, a bit analytical. Let's just get on with life and remember that life is for living and not for just existing; for being open to new experiences; for living 30,000 days and not living one day 30,000 times. Starting today.