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The older I get, the more I enjoy Saturday mornings. Perhaps it's
the quiet solitude that comes with being the first to rise, or maybe
it's the unbounded joy of not having to be at work. Either way,
the first few hours of a Saturday morning are most enjoyable.
A few weeks ago, I was shuffling toward the basement shack
with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and the morning
paper in the other. What began as a typical Saturday morning,
turned into one of those lessons that life seems to hand you
from time to time. Let me tell you about it.
I turned the dial up into the phone portion of the band on my
ham radio in order to listen to a Saturday morning swap net.
Along the way, I came across an older sounding chap, with a
tremendous signal and a golden voice. You know the kind,
he sounded like he should be in the broadcasting business.
He was telling whoever he was talking with something about
"a thousand marbles."
I was intrigued and stopped to listen to what he had to say.
"Well, Tom, it sure sounds like you're busy with your job. I'm
sure they pay you well but it's a shame you have to be away
from home and your family so much. Hard to believe a young
fellow should have to work sixty or seventy hours a week to
make ends meet. Too bad you missed your daughter's dance
recital."
He continued, "Let me tell you something Tom, something that
has helped me keep a good perspective on my own priorities."
And that's when he began to explain his theory of a "thousand
marbles."
You see, I sat down one day and did a little arithmetic. The
average person lives about seventy-five years. I know, some
live more and some live less, but on average, folks live about
seventy-five years."
"Now then, I multiplied 75 times 52 and I came up with 3900
which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has
in their entire lifetime. Now stick with me Tom, I'm getting to
the important part."
"It took me until I was fifty-five years old to think about all this
in any detail," he went on, "and by that time I had lived through
over twenty-eight hundred Saturdays. I got to thinking that if I
lived to be seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them
left to enjoy."
"So I went to a toy store and bought every single marble they
had. I ended up having to visit three toy stores to roundup
1000 marbles. I took them home and put them inside of a large,
clear plastic container right here in the shack next to my gear.
Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out and
thrown it away."
"I found that by watching the marbles diminish, I focused more
on the really important things in life. There is nothing like
watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your
priorities straight."
"Now let me tell you one last thing before I sign-off with you
and take my lovely wife out for breakfast. This morning, I took
the very last marble out of the container. I figure if I make it until
next Saturday then I have been given a little extra time. And the
one thing we can all use is a little more time."
"It was nice to meet you Tom, I hope you spend more time with
your family, and I hope to meet you again here on the band. 75
year Old Man, this is K9NZQ, clear and going QRT, good
morning!"
You could have heard a pin drop on the band when this fellow
signed off. I guess he gave us all a lot to think about. I had
planned to work on the antenna that morning, and then I was
going to meet up with a few hams to work on the next club
newsletter.
Instead, I went upstairs and woke my wife up with a kiss. "C'mon
honey, I'm taking you and the kids to breakfast."
"What brought this on?" she asked with a smile. "Oh, nothing
special, it's just been a long time since we spent a Saturday
together with the kids. Hey, can we stop at a toy store while we're
out? I need to buy some marbles."
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发表于 2007-9-21 18:45
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