Stop making excuses and start making memories
“Daddy, can we go sledding?”
Everything in me did not want to do sledding that Wednesday afternoon. I had a head cold. We needed to get ready for church. We’d only been back in MN for 6 months and my blood had not changed from African thin to Scandinavian thick. The head cold was my real trump card.
Temptation set in.
“There’s always tomorrow.”
“The snow isn’t going to melt anytime soon.”
“Daddy doesn’t have snow gear.” That’s legit right?
“You just got home from school, mom wants to spend time with you.”
“The Ozone layer has a hole in it.”
Daddy, can we go sledding?
One of the most popular mantras is “No Regrets.” While I think its a great slogan, no one can live without regrets. We all have regrets. I regret not making the NBA. The reality though was that was unlikely to ever happen. I also regret missing events and birthdays in my nieces and nephews’ lives. I lived in Africa.
There is a difference though between No Regrets and No Avoidable Regrets.
We went sledding. I fell on the ice. I got a snow wedgie. I climbed the hill, dealt with whiny little ones fighting over which sled to ride and who could ride with whom. But what I didn’t do was regret a moment of it.
And 20 years from now, my kids will be persuing all Facebook posts, and youtube channels when those medium are static and filled with old folks. And they find pictures of us sledding.
No (Avoidable) Regrets.