Stop and Smell the Flowers

Recently an old High School buddy and someone else that I know suffered the very sudden and out of the blue deaths of their wives and it reaffirmed to me how fragile life can be. I can’t imagine the grief these two are suffering and my sincerest condolences go out to both of them and their families.

My blog has a rather unique focus that’s “Critically Thinking About Things That Change Our Society” and personally I think that how we react to death can change how we perceive the world around us and that can be the pebble in the water for change, both good and bad. After the death of a family member some people get angry at themselves for the things they didn’t do while their loved one was alive, some get angry at the world around them and lash out, and others find some kind of peace in remembering the time they spent with their loved one. One thing for sure, in the midst of all the grief surrounding the death, life goes on for the living and how we move forward after a death in the family is a choice. So this is kind of like “Critically Thinking About Things That Change Our Lives” and how that can have reverberating effects on those around us and sometimes, just maybe, those ripples will expand outside our little world.

Hopefully something can be learned from a death in the family that can be passed on to others like dropping a pebble in the water. Here’s what I’ve learned by observing the unfortunate regret of others over the years after a family member has died. First, sometimes regret can consume you; and second, to help prevent massive post death regret, whether it’s yours or those around you, do things while living that allow for a rapid transition to peace after death. Simply put, stop and smell the flowers with the ones you love and hopefully they will learn from it and pass it on to others in their life, thus the spreading ripples of sharing life and reducing regret. Don’t set yourself, or the rest of your family, up for regret be an example of what to do instead of what not to do.

I’ve found that shifting focus from work, away from self imposed deadlines, away from the honey-do list, away from things that can cause stress, etc. and instead focus on the things that make life worth living. Do this on some kind of predefined schedule whether it’s weekly or monthly, just do it! Remember, you work to support your life outside of work so damnit, have a life outside of work! Taking the time out for whatever you consider family and stop to smell the flowers in the world around us can give us a better sense of balance in life and will help prevent that sense of regret later.

On a personal note; my wife and I seem to be really enjoying things like taking a brief road trip to a neat place for a Saturday or Sunday afternoon lunch with a lake view or visiting a picturesque winery or museum or botanical garden in another city that we hadn’t seen before. We don’t spend a lot of money doing these things, sometimes it’s only the cost of gas. As an example, we drove forty-five minutes one way just to see this picturesque mill and historic country church in southern Wisconsin and we had a great conversation along the drive, enjoyed the scenery, and talked about all kinds of things including more short road trips and big vacations.

We’ve taken many of these short day trips over the past few years, to name a few: Governor Dodge State Park with grandson to do some hiking and see the waterfall and lake, Wildcat Mountain and Blue Mounds State Parks to see the fall colors from elevated overlooks, Buckhorn and Lake Kegonsa State Park for a little hiking, and a mid day trip to Lake Geneva to have a lake view lunch and another day trip there to take a boat tour. I think we’ve visited almost every small winery within 50 miles at some point in time and visited some larger regional wineries within a couple of hours drive to take in the scenery and taste a few new things and we might even buy a bottle to add to our meager wine stash so we have something to pull out every few weeks to share while watching a movie or playing Cribbage.

My point for this entire post is hopefully to inspire others to get out and do something with loved ones, go for a drive, stop every once in a while, relax, get out and walk around, absorb the beauty of the world around you, have fun, laughing is great medicine, and smell the flowers together. What makes these routine or regular outings “special” is that you get to smell the flowers together and that is very important to help prevent regrets later in life.

To those that have suffered great family loss, I sincerely hope regrets don’t outweigh finding peace.