Living Well

It is no coincidence that I was in the middle of listening to a podcast about longevity when my Granddad went to glory. I had also been talking to my mom about health when we last visited. She relayed some of the habits she saw people her age doing in order to maintain their health. I admired how she and my dad were trying to take a moderate approach: walking daily, taking their vitamins and supplements, trying to keep their prescriptions as few as possible, and eating healthy while not giving up everything they loved. I relayed how I now often drink out of plastic water bottles (something over which I once panicked), go out to get hamburgers (my husband's favorite food) pretty frequently, and buy foods that (gasp!) contain preservatives when I can't find other options, or just can't be bothered to look. Losing Granddad made me reconsider all this, not from a perspective of wanting to change any of my habits, but from the perspective that nothing can extend life forever. Living in a sin-stained world means we will all die.

If I am going to die, though, I want to live well. Granddad did that. He exercised, walking and doing calisthenics into his nineties. Even from the wheelchair which confined him these past few years, he tried to engage in activities like bowling with his nursing home cohorts. Granddad took his vitamins and prescriptions. He wore hearing aids. He also ate dessert with almost every lunch, and when he could no longer cook for himself, he ate the food his nursing home prepared for him.

I think Granddad's healthy habits helped him live long, and that is saying something considered that he nearly died of an appendicitis in his middle adult year. He traveled to I don't know how many countries, and to most of the continents. He helped build the home in which he and my nana lived for most of their later years. He moved he and Nana cross country when it came time to leave that home. He cared for Nana up until the last few months of her life, which involved doing all of the household chores, as well as carrying her from room to room when she needed to move. He survived prostate issues as well as the removal of a cantaloupe-sized mass from his abdomen. He drove up until my parents moved him into assisted living, and then long-term care. He lived a good life, until he didn't, falling so often that he needed to be confined to a wheelchair and then lost his strength to walk.

Maybe it's morbid to relay the fact that Granddad's healthy living didn't save him, but I think that's the point. He cared for himself the best he could, given the circumstances, but that wasn't his life. His life was in Jesus. His live was caring for others. He lived well, not because he focused on some wellness regimen for longevity, but because he valued life and lived it to its fullest.

I was not thinking of Granddad when I wrote on my birthday that I wanted to reclaim my life, but that goal seems even more appropriate after losing Granddad. Only God knows the number of years we will get on this earth. For Granddad it was 94. For me, it may be more or less. Either way, I want to make those years count!

Living my life needs to involve some matter of self-care, but for me, living my life may mean that I actually get a few less years out of it, if living more years requires living a constrained, overly regimented life. That's okay with me. If I live every day to its fullest, I will have a full life. That's what I want, in Granddad's honor, and for God's glory.

So if you see me over here running races that perhaps aren't the best for my health, or eating one too many hamburgers, know I am good for it. If my body doesn't look quite as fit as I could, but I am taking care of it in a moderate way, see that this is not my top priority. My top priorities are loving God, loving people, and enjoying life, supplements included only if they contribute to the above goals.