Your Greatest Moment

I can sit here and think of many great moments in my life, and I could tell you stories with surprising accuracy how they all happened. But I would be hard pressed to beat the birth of my daughter as the greatest.

I don't just say that because it sounds cool, or that's what I think people would like to hear. To me, it sounds very un-original and mainstream. I think if you were to ask this question to any parent, they would tell you that it's the same for them. I hardly ever run with the norm in life, but this would be something I would be happy to agree with.

Previous to being a father, my moments were all self-serving and they all were similar in nature. It was meeting someone I admired, seeing something I've always wanted to see, or going somewhere I've always wanted to go. -Great moments for sure, but not the greatest.

The greatest moment usually comes out of nowhere and presents itself when you least expect it, making the moment even more surreal. It makes it go by in the blink of the eye, making you question, "Did that really happen?"

Mostly, I can think of moments spent with loved ones which were just me and them, and now those moments have passed into memory since they have since passed away. Those are great moments too, because they will always remain in your heart for the duration of the memory that you created. You always have "alone time" with your beloved anytime you want to visit them.

There are things that you do for others that you are either very proud of, or that you keep to yourself in anonymity. But either way, you do them because it makes you feel good about doing it. Very rarely is a random act of kindness ever for the other person, but how it makes us feel to do it, or see their reaction. So these moments, while they might do some incredibly great things, are not the greatest.

Maybe your greatest moment was something in the past that can never be usurped. Maybe it was a childhood triumph, or the luckiest day of your life that will never happen again. Maybe you struck it rich on one day, and the life that you now lead is such that you believe that it was your greatest moment?

For me, it was watching that little head come into this world and the responsibility it brought with her. It was looking at my mother and father's eyes as I passed them their only grandchild and watched their reaction to their baby, having a baby.

Life passes you by so quickly. For some, it seems to take forever and for the rest of us, there is just never enough time. Every moment that passes us by lingers to the next one, until you have a collage of moments. It's like walking down a buffet line of moments in your life and picking out the greatest ones and having a full plate at the end of the line...

That's the way I want to live my life.

A full plate at the end of the line, and being so full of great moments that I'm stuffed!

And then my time will come, just like the rest of us, to pass on and leave this world with the moments that I've created. -And we all create great ones.

These are the greatest things in life; so if you have a great moment to come, or you are still holding on to it, may the remaining part of 2009, and all of the upcoming decade be yours to own...