AHEAD

I heard a man speak tonight, a man with much of his life behind him.  He spoke experience to a small group of young people – not young by their own reckonings, but young if they were being honest.  He was a picture of what they could be.  His was a life well spent.

His was the voice of time – rambling, sometimes forging ahead with purpose, sometimes wandering down a path tangential to his theme.  The stores of his knowledge were not a line; he had a web of memory and learning to share, and the absence of perfect organization only betrayed how much he had to give. 

He leaned in to tell us the secret of his age: “I’m seventy-seven!”  He chuckled, but he spoke earnestly.  “I don’t have many more days.  You have a lifetime ahead!”

And we knew, after hearing the wisdom within his web, that our lifetimes would be worthwhile if each of us served our creator as faithfully as this man.