A series of happen-stance events left me with forty minutes to spend writing this morning. The only catch, those events include the fact that my laptop battery is completely dead, and I forgot my badge, so I am locked out of the office until someone else arrives. It is just my thoughts, a hot cup of Americano coffee, and my iPad. While I cannot work on my book, I can take some time to reflect and think.
On the drive in, I neared the last chapter of the book, The Measure by Nikki Erlick. The book opens with everyone in the world receiving a box that contains a string. The world soon comes to understand that the length of one’s string is the measure of the remainder of their life on Earth. Some folks choose not to look, others are forced to look, or someone peeks at their string without their permission. In short time, those with a short string in their box, dubbed “Short stringers”, with less time left to live, become a social class of their own, discriminated against in many aspects of life, including their careers, romantic pursuits, insurance premiums, and ability to adopt children. The writer takes us on a journey of the intertwined lives of short-stringers and long-stringers.
Naturally, the book raises questions in the reader’s mind. Would you look at your string? What would you do once you came to know the date of your death? If you have a long string, would you continue your present relationship with someone with a short string, knowing that the inevitable sorrow of their death awaits? For me, I would look at the length of my string, and no matter what I would remain in love with the person that I love now. I believe that he would do the same.
Why would I want to know how much time I have left? I would want to know because it would allow me to plan my future from a financial aspect. If I only have 15 years left here on Earth, than it is past time to retire. If I have 30 or more years left, then I need to work a few more years. While the answers to the questions that the book raises are straight forward for me, I feel that the author of the book does an exceptional job of character development that makes me appreciate why the answers to these life questions would be different for others.
A focus of the book is a support group for short stringers. There are different groups for one, depending on the length of their time left. The particular support group the book focuses on is a group of short-stringers with an 8-to-15-year lifespan range. This allows the author to give the reader perspectives from different walks of life, brought together by the same predicament.
For me, the support group brought on thoughts that I could not help but allow to occupy my mind. If my life expectancy is the same as my mother’s or my father’s, then I am a qualified member of this support group. If my parents had known in their late forties that they would never see their sixties, what would they have done differently? I can tell you after being by my mother’s side as she lived the last year of her life knowing that she had less than a year to live, that Mom would worry less. She would not worry about what others thought. She would forgive herself for her past mistakes. She would embrace life. She would focus on her own goals, instead of what others thought that she should do with her time. She would spend her time with the people she valued most, just as she did in that last year of her life.
After a long, rainy drive in propelling the start of a frustrating morning, I am resetting my thoughts, and I am going to live today as if I am a short stringer. Off I go!