A student of mine asked me how I would want to spend my last day on earth. I wrote this reply and thought it would be fun to post it here as well.
What Would You Do if You Only Had One Day to Live?
I enjoy excitement as much as the next person. I like going to a good amusement park or going to a fun movie or an entertaining play. I’m a real city boy. I love city life with it’s architecture, crowds, grocery stores filled with diverse food from all over the world, and coffee shops. I would never want to move out to the country and live a quiet life away from people. How would you want to spend your last day on the planet? I think many people would want their last day to be full of excitement and they would want to be doing something special. I wouldn’t want to be doing any of that if I knew I had only one day to live. If I knew I had only one more day left on this planet, I would want to go off into nature.
Even though I don’t want to live my life out in the woods somewhere, I think that is where I would like to spend my last day. I would like it to be a sunny space with lots of trees at the edge of a beach, so I could enjoy both the forest and the ocean at the same time. I want to be able to hear the ocean waves and the sounds of birds and many different kinds of forrest animals. I’d want to be able to smell both the crisp salty air of the sea and the woody pine scent of the trees. I would also want to see a sky filled with stars after a dazzling sunset.
I don’t want a lot of people there, but I’d like to spend my last day with about two or three good friends. I’d like to talk, eat some good but rustic food like lasagna and panini, and of course there would have to be lots of very dark coffee. I might like to have some red wine, but I could pass on that. Between our comfortable and familiar chats, sharing our memories, I’d like to take a couple of leisurely strolls: one down the ocean and one among the trees. After the sun set, I would want to build a nice campfire and maybe even toast some marshmallows. We might even make s’mores. I would definitely want to have a lot of very dark chocolate on hand.
I think I would like my last day to end lying next to a campfire, staring up at the stars, and listening to the sounds of nature. I’d like to drift off listening to the waves, the crackle and pop of the fire, and maybe some crickets. I’d like to feel the warmth of the fire on my skin and the cool mist of the ocean breeze. I’d like the scents of the elements, fire, water, earth, air, and metal in my nose as I took my last breath.
