Thursday 5 July 2007

Am I living my dash?


One of the Crows Nest Shire Councillors has a business called; Livin' the Dash. This made no sense to me so I asked his wife when I saw her at the Hampton Food & Wine festival. She'd already had a few to drink, and so was very fluent in telling me what the philosophy was all about. She started off reciting a poem but realised she'd forgotten, but it didn't matter, I'd understood the gist of the story. She gave me a sloppy High Five with a big grin on her face and wandered back into the crowd. I made a mental note to google the poem:


I know of a man who stood to speak at the funeral of a friend. He referred to the dates on the tombstone from the beginning... to the end. He noted that first came the date of birth, and spoke the following date with tears, but he said what mattered most of all was the dash between those years.

1948 - 2001 for that dash represents all the time spent alive on earth...and now only those who loved that person know what that little line is worth. For it matters not how much we own, the cars...the house...the cash...what matters is how we live and love and how we spend our dash.
So think about this long and hard...are there things you'd like to change? For you never know how much time is left and what you can rearrange. If we could just slow down enough to consider what's true and real, and try to understand how other people feel. And be less quick to anger, and show appreciation more and love the people in our lives like we've never loved before. If we treat each other with respect and more often wear a smile... remembering that this special dash might only last a little while.

So when your eulogy is being read with your life's actions to rehash...will you be proud of the things they say about how you spent your dash? (Anon)

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

thats the trouble with eulogies, kinda after the fact, if one is intent on playing to an audience. Perhaps Andy Kauffman had the right idea. Though I've always envisaged a classy mixture of surpressed laughter and operatic discourse in the background... dont get me started on the rouble with anything ever written by anyone anonymous...

Anonymous said...

that brought tears to my eyes.

Danielle said...

This poem has reminded me of what is really important in life. It's so easy to get caught up in the rat race. Everyone wants to have it all these days- the car, the house, the money, the career. Kinda makes you forget where the real richness of life comes from. Hope you don't mind but i posted the poem on myspace. Its something I think all sydney-siders should read.
Peace and love
xx