An interesting word “deadline-“ the time by which something MUST be done or completed. Death can be an unexpected event that stops you from accomplishing many things on your TO DO list. A college friend of mine, a few years old than me, suddenly died recently after minor surgery. I had talked with her just a week previous and she was lamenting about all the stacks of papers to sort that were on her desk. Now she doesn’t have to worry about them. Unless you are currently battling a terminal disease, you have no idea how long you’ll live. Therefore, nothing in your life gets a dead-line.
Many retirees pick out cemetery plots and signup for funeral services, but never think twice about writing down their feelings about their life as a farewell to their family. Retirement years can give you the opportunity to finally write down some thoughts for your descendents that you’d like to leave. Whether it’s a special letter to each family member or writing your biography, these items seldom make it to your “bucket list.” (Photo on the left of my aunt Bonnie and uncle Weston both now deceased, I tried for years to get them to write their life stories but it didn't happen-now they are gone. They are standing by the Vernon family cemetery plot by the Rockport Utah reservoir.)
So, for all you procrastinators out there, I’m going set a deadline for you to complete your life story. November 7, 2011 will begin a special Senior Week sponsored by the Senior Sampler. I would like to have a table to showcase the life histories that my readers (YOU) have created this past year utilizing the writing prompts that have been in my column for many months. Call into the office 435-673-7604 and leave your name if you’re willing to take this challenge. It’s time to commit to this important project. (I also challenge my blogging friends regardless of your age to write your life story.)
Hopefully you have started gathering some memories from your life that you’d like to share with your family, if only to preserve the memories of your parents and grandparents. Remember the first stage is to collect a ROUGH DRAFT of all the experiences you want to write about. The next step is to EDIT, then SCAN in photos that you want to use in your life story. Soon, it’s time to PUBLISH and SHARE with others.
It’s now almost May with the summer ahead of you, a perfect time to organize all you’ve written and start editing in preparation for publishing your history by Nov 7th. With a specific deadline in mind, you have no excuses. If you haven’t even started to collect stories or photos, it’s not too late. Start today.