Close your eyes and imagine...

that you're watching television in the 1979.  You're watching a program called "Diff'rent Strokes", the story of a wealthy man who adopts the two sons of his former housekeeper.  Now he has three kids and a new housekeeper.  The five actors in the show were Dana Plato (the daughter), Gary Coleman (the younger son), Todd Bridges (the older son), Charlotte Rae (the new housekeeper) and Conrad Bain (the wealthy man who adopted the two black boys).

When the show started in 1978, their respective ages were:

Plato - 13
Coleman - 10
Bridges - 13
Rae - 54
Bain - 55

No one looking at an episode of this show during the first season could have possibly predicted that two of the three children would die before the two adult actors.  No one knew that the other child actor would suffer from drug addiction and run-ins with the law before turning things around.  Now only Charlotte Rae and Todd Bridges survive from a TV sitcom that made its debut 35 years ago this fall.

It just proves that we don't know what the future holds for any of us.  There are paths for us to take.  Choices that we make.  Promises we break (some we keep too).  We just don't know where any of those paths or choices will end up leading.  Or how many days, indeed how many hours, we will walk the planet and make choices or walk paths.

So why do we keep on walking down those paths and making those choices?  Because it's part of living.  Movie metaphor again.  This time from "The Shawshank Redemption" and it's a classic.  "Get busy living or get busy dying".  That's why most of us keep on going and doing and choosing and walking.  We're busy living.

Sometimes we tend to take life for granted and I'm not saying every day should involve reflection and contemplation of the meaning of our existence.  But once in a while it is a good thing to stop and remember.  35 years ago I could have gotten any of you to wager that the three kids in that cast would outlive the two adults.