May we all die RICH....

[Seajay]

(note to admin. If I have already published this feel free to delete it. cj.)

Life, Why Me, Why Now?


If I live till April I will be 71. Like most of you I never ever figured to live to be 70 years old. In my 70 years I have lived many lives. Yep, many lives to this day and I believe this is the last one.
My first life was as a baby. Sorry, I dont remember much about that because I was usually hungry or pooping in my pants or saying ''Goo'' because that was my only vocabulary. That life was a loooooooong time ago.
My next life was when I was about six years old. I was still hungry but I had stopped pooping in my pants and my vocabulary had risen to a lot of words. Life was a new adventure with school and learning and new friends and the great adventure of summer time when you could go barefooted and make things like sling shots and spears and you could ''Make believe'' anything you could think of. In that life I was a gladiator and a ships captain. I was ''Bumba'' the jungle boy and I was ''The Captain Copper Head'', crime fighter, and my ''Copper Head'' was a painted lard bucket with a couple holes punched in the side and the wire bail under my chin. I bumped into a lot of trees but I always beat up the bad guys like ''The Captain''.......
Back then cowboys were real people and they had a six shooter that would shoot about forty times and they rode horses that were smarter than any outlaw in a black hat and the heros like Gene Autry and Roy Rogers because they could easily beat up any bad guy and never lose their white hat. It was amazing to me but it was real as life.
When I was about seven, Ms Hodgen died. She was in her seventies and she was our neighbor that I drew water for and carried wood in for her. She was always nice to me with good pies and cakes and lots of good things to eat and she always had lots of goodies in her pantry. Mom explained that death is a part of life and it would happen to all of us someday. She was my friend and why did she have to die now? Why did this bad thing happen to me that I should lose a friend. Why me,,,,,,,,,,Why now?


My next life started when I was thirteen. Yep, the ''teenage years''..... Puberty …....... My voice changing from a squeak to the beginning of a mans voice. My interests changed seemingly over night. GIRLS. WOW.. Little snot nose Annie Mae became a little lady with ''bumps'' on her chest and a ribbon in her hair. I threw away my cowboy hat and got me a real ball cap. My feet grew and it seemed that about every few months Mom was buying me bigger clothes. From fifteen to sixteen was forever. It seemed like it took four years to get from fifteen to sixteen. DRIVING LICENSE...... DATING..... The adventure began and my life was good. That year my friend Gary Misenhamer was killed in a truck wreck. He had skipped school on Thursday so he could go to Florida with his girlfriends dad to deliver furniture. Gary was fifteen years old. I lost a friend that I had known all my life............ Why him?........Why now?........Why is life so mean?.........


My next life started at eighteen when I graduated from high school and joined Uncle Sams Navy. ''HOLLY KAMOLIE'', what a life, what an adventure. Dress Navy blues and a ''girl in every port'' if you had a couple dollars. TRAVEL and seeing the world thru a porthole and over the rim of a glass of beer. New friends, new places, new adventure. LINDA CAROLE SPICER.... wearing pedal pushers and her dads white shirt. Pink cascade rollers in her hair. Very shy because all she said was ''Hi'' when my cousin Edith introduced us. Two years later I married this shy girl. A new life began for us.


My next life started when I left the Navy and got my first real job making $1.25 an hour. My first raise was two and a half cents. WOW, the next raise was a whole nickle. We were rich. In 64 ''Dad Bentley'' died of a heart attack. I had known this family since age 12. He was no direct relation to me but he seemed like family. They lived above Boone at a settlement called Vilas. I spent many summers with them. Dad Bentley was about 77..... Why him...Why Now...... Why is life so cruel....


My next life began in 1977 when my best friend Tommy Johnson and I started a business in his two car garage. We worked hard and long and made the business grow. We rented 1200 square feet and filled it in 15 months and we bought 6000 square feet and paid for it in four years and we filled the building with machinery and we bought 12000 square feet and roared toward the future like a couple of lions in a chicken coop..... In May of 1988 we laid out another 14000 square feet addition on the building. Life was good. On July 1st,1988 my brother by another mother, my best friend, my partner whom I would trust with my life was killed in a motor cycle accident in Washington state close to Mt. St. Helen. Tommy, Linda and myself had taken a much deserved three week vacation. W H Y?????????? WHY HIM????? WHY NOW????????? WHY DID THIS HAPPEN TO ME???????? WHY? Life was hard for a very long time.........


My next life started on October 1, 1995. Sunday morning about eight thirty. Alone in the shop working on a sample. Hummmmm? I got a chill? My jaw is hurting and my left arm feels kinda funny. Little pain in my chest like indigestion......Hummmmm? I sat on the curb stone in front of Brigmans Clinic waiting on nine oclock when it opened.
''How can we help you sir?''
''I think I am having a heart attack mam''
''Don't move, don't blink. Don't do nothing''
''Who can drive my pickup back home for me. My wife is in Granite Falls visiting her sister''...........
''Who the hell cares right now mister. Just lay still because we have the ambulance on its way to take you to High Point Regional Hospital.''
WHY ME???????????? WHY NOW???????? I DONT HAVE TIME FOR THIS RIGHT NOW........... ''Who is gonna drive my pick up home for me?''


My next life started about June of 1999 when we started building a new house in Granite Falls. I had retired from the business in 95 when I promoted a friend to run the business. He had done well and I sold him the business in 2000. I carried the note on the business and I built Linda a new house on the lot next to her sister in Granite Falls, NC. We bought a 2000 Pace Arrow, 33 feet long with most of the bells and whistles on it. Life was good and Linda and I traveled the USA and Canada. In 2001 I had a ''small heart attack where a vain in my heart closed up and made a route around the clot'' No big deal.... I was 61 years old and I figured Linda would outlive me by a ton. She had always been healthy and only visited the doctor for her ''woman check ups''.... In 2003 we were looking on a tour to Mexico. Copper Canyon for about 45 days. Leaving sometime in January I think. For her Christmas present I was secretly talking to a man about buying her a Jaguar. Forrest Hunter Green with a hand stitched interior with all the ''stuff'' on it. Hell of a Christmas present. I was gonna have her cousin deliver it Christmas eve with a big red bow on top.... Linda woke on September 30 with a head ache and by ten thirty am she was on the way to the hospital. BRAIN ANURISUM..
She was pronounced dead on October first, 2003......... My world died with her.............. WHY NOW? WHY HER? WHY,WHY, WHY.......? What did she do to deserve death? I cursed God, I cursed the doctors, I cursed life. I walked the walls of our house and wished to die. I slept on the sofa with a 357 in one hand and her picture in the other. I lived life sometimes one minute at the time........TICK TICK TICK.......... WHY WHY WHY............ TICK TICK TICK..... LIFE WAS NOTHING...... TICK TICK TICK ….. NOTHING WAS NOTHING..... I WANTED TO BE DEAD.....


I would go to Walmart to walk around the store and be with people so I would not shoot myself in the head. In January of 04 I saw a pretty lady in Walmart. I smiled and she smiled back and we had coffee and talked. It was then that my ''next life began''
She had lost her husband in 02 in a motorcycle accident. We ''dated and traveled together and got to know each other. In 05 we went to Alaska for four months and in 06 we married at Niagara Falls and this life is good again.


I have no idea what this life holds for me. My Willa is my life now. We try to live each day with great abundance and great joy. We look to the positive in all things now with much gratefulness of the joy of having each other. We live and love, we smile and sometimes cry and we laugh at every opportunity now. We have traveled in the coach some sixty thousand miles and went to the Caribbean on a cruise and back to Alaska on the inside passage for fourteen days. She and I have covered all the states except Hawaii and Minnesota. And we have covered most of Canada. We winter in Florida and we live life and love life and love each other with all our strength.


I really feel that this is my last life. I feel that there are no more ahead of me and it is my wish that when and if God decides to take one of us, I pray that he will take me because I could not and would not live without My Willa......




Poor is the man that dies rich with money but has never loved or laughed or cried or shared life with another.


Rich is the man that dies with memories of friends and the love of a woman.
Rich is the man that dies and people miss him and wish him back in their presence for his laughter and his wit, his charm and his voice, his kindness and his sharing of life.


May we all die rich............ Seajay the sailor man ..

[Chickadee]

Seajay:

You're indeed already a "rich" man. The secret I'm learning from you and your wonderful posts is that the more one "shares" their riches, as you so eloquently do, the "richer" one becomes.

What a different world this would be if we all learned to share our "riches" in our day to day lives and exchanges with each other.

Thanks.

Steve & Lynette

[JSW]

What a post! What amazing lives you have lived. Thanks for your gifted words

[BigSkyBob]

Words of wisdom. Words of sadness and joy. Words of encouragement and enlightenment. Best of all, words reflective of reality. If only humanity would absorb some of your positive thinking.

[gene2]

Great story Seajay. A good reminder to take life as we get it & make the most of it. Good inspiration!

[frankdamp]

My philosophy is that if your heirs can go out to dinner on their inheritance, you got it just right. If they can have a week in Mexico, you were close. Anything more than that, you blew it.

We view our MH as a way of spending our childrens' inheritance. They can find their own way in life - we had to.

[buckeyeduffer]

Thanks CJ - great post. Our best to you and your bride.

[Seajay]

Many thanks for your kind words concerning my post about ''Dieing Rich''. I think what I am trying to say is that ''Life'' is seldom as we ''plan it''. I know ''Life'' has seldom followed a plan for me very long and I suspect it is about the same for most everyone. Uncontrollable events push us off course and the ''luck of the draw'' will most of the time affect your life in a way you never planned. I hope I am not the only one that has asked himself if I am making the right decision. I have often pondered just what would have happened ''IF'' I had done something different with my life as it advanced. Things so simple and really stupid as not going to Wall Mart that day and meeting My Willa by chance. Or was it ''by chance''?????? Was it planned by a higher power or simply the ''luck of the draw'' that we met and we both were lonely people that had lost a spouse and needed another to make our life complete again. Such is life and the wonderment of it.........
To be honest I firmly believe that ''Life'' is one day long and no more. Think about it.... Yesterday is gone. We can remember it, think about it, profit by any mistake we made yesterday and try not to screw up as bad making the same mistake again. ''Yesterday I was looking under my coach and you put your knee in a big pile of dog pooooooh. Yuckie …... I will try not to do that again Tomorrow.
......lol... We can profit from Yesterday but we can not change it.......


Tomorrow is not here yet unless you live in Australia and its already ''Tomorrow'' over there........ The best we can do is plan for tomorrow, hope for tomorrow, save for tomorrow and watch out for ''dog poooooooh'' when we look under the coach and know this for sure. For some of us, maybe me and possibly you, THERE IS NO TOMORROW.........(kinda scary aint it?)


All you really got is ''TODAY''......... Yep, good old ''TODAY''. One more opportunity to get it right. One more opportunity to really love that special someone that you are sharing your life with and to tell that special person that you ''LOVE THEM WITH ALL YOUR BEING''.....
One more opportunity to get it right and forgive an old enemy that has insulted or cheated you in some way. If ''hate'' would kill, I would have left a lot of dead bodies along the road of life. All are forgiven now for I have not the time or energy to hate anymore.
One more opportunity to get it right and make another friend or to do something nice for a total stranger and expect nor want anything in return for what you did except that good warm ''fuzzy'' feeling you get by sharing with someone less fortunate than yourself even if it is nothing more than giving a fellow motorest a ''break'' in the line of traffic. Something so simple yet so rewarding for your inner peace.
One more opportunity to get it right and to have enough friends to carry you to your grave sight.
One more opportunity to get it right and hope no one ''tinkles'' on your grave stone and is glad that your sorry butt is stone dead.....
One more opportunity to get it right and ''not put your knee in the dog poooh when you look under your coach again''.......
In my humble opinion we got one shot at this life guys, one try to get it right and I believe we only have one day to do it in.
Be safe and I hope I see each and everyone of you tomorrow.


Thanks again for the kind words ….

[CorsairIIAT]

Very well said in both your posts. Fair winds and following seas SHIPMATE. Although am 20 years your junior I concider you a close friend.