The Legacy we Leave...

Heaven
 
All our lives we're told that this is the place to which we should aspire. Live a good life and you are guaranteed a spot.  A place where we are ageless and all the shackles of the earthly world are left behind.  Excellent. We'll finally find out who really killed J.F.K and if, in fact, Elvis is dead. 

I recently asked Pink her definition of Heaven to which she responded, It is a big cloud in the sky with a house on it, just like Mommy's. Papa and Nemo live there. So does Uncle, Grandpa, Mitzi and Tocchet. In her short five years on this earth, these are the people and animals she's lost. One fish, two crotchety cats, a dear family friend, a great grandfather and, most recently, her beloved Papa Mike.  She's been struggling with this lately in her own five year old way, trying to balance what her father and I have told her with the reality. It's an awesome place, but you don't get to come back.  How bittersweet is that? Not just for a preschooler, but for all of us.  


As a parent I know that this is the time, not to scare her into fearing death, but to focus more on the legacy left behind.  This is the time for her father and I to help her begin to shape her own legacy. To help her answer the question, "What will people say about you when you're gone?"  


Her Papa was a great man in every sense.  Devoted to his family, friends and God.  He loved one woman for over thirty-five years and, with her, raised three strong men.  He built a community law practice from the ground up and his clients were friends first and foremost. And he loved Pink and Tink with a lion's heart. And they loved him like children love...all the way to the core, no questions asked.  Every time Tink smiles her sweet gap-toothed grin, I see him. Every time Pink buries her face in my neck and squeezes, I can feel him.  They don't know it yet, but they are his legacy. And what an amazing one to leave behind.  


So what will be said about you? Or any of us? If we live our days cognizant of this, we will be better and do better for others.  If we are lucky enough, our legacy will resemble Papa Mike's.