20/21 Years

Twenty or twenty-one years ago right this moment I was being given anesthesia and asked to count backwards from 100. I was going into surgery for them to remove my necrotic left kidney and I was actually pretty sure I wasn't going to be coming out of it. I had, in fact, been really, really pissed that the nurses wouldn't let me see the flowers that had been delivered ahead of time because I KNEW my sister, aunt and my mother had gone all out. My son was 2 (either just turned or getting ready to) and I was really afraid that I wasn't going to be around to raise him. I did know that if I did make it, things were going to change a bit.

First -- there are things you can't help. Realize it and let it go. Getting angry is not going to move the cars in the traffic jam out of your way. Really.

People are who and what they are. You don't get to change them any more than they get to change you. Deal with it. If you can't, avoid them. But don't ask them to do things they are actually completely incapable of doing. It's cruel, and an exercise in frustration.

There are more important things than money. Granted, it's hard to get by without it, but you need to keep it in perspective. It's a tool to get you what you need and what you want. Nothing more. Like any other tool it can be used or abused.

People can change, but only if THEY are willing to. You can't make them want... whatever. You can't, in fact, MAKE anybody feel anything. If it isn't there, it just isn't.

There are things worth dying for. Most of them aren't "things."

Life is short. Don't blow it. Try to live so that you won't have regrets if it ends tomorrow, because it just might.

I need to get to work, but while everybody else is celebrating their love, I'm just celebrating, because I got 21 pretty terrific years.

LIVE AND LOVE WITH EVERYTHING YOU'VE GOT.

Cie