Tht Man on the Ground

 I had a sad experience last week at a road in the town where I live.It was a Halloween race,4.5 miles, and about sixty people participated.We  had a nice morning , much warmer than we might have expected for the end of October , and the race itself was a lot of  fun.

   After I had been in for a few minutes , though , I noticed a group of people huddled over something on the ground about fifty geet from the finish line,I went over to see what it was just as the paramedics arrived.It was one of the competitors , a man in his fifties , He was lying on his back completely motionless , and someone was giving hin CPR until the paramedics took over and started to do the same thing,adding shots and electronics to the attempt.

  It was pretty plain to see,though,that he was already dead.Although the paramedics did everything they could,they wern't able to bring him back to  life.What had started out as a fun moring for everyone had taken on a bit of a darker hue.It seemed , though,that almost no one who had run the race knew him personally,so while there was plenty of concern among the runners ,there was not a whole lot of mourning ,Besides,when they put him away,none of the paramedics actually told us that he was dead,so nobody really knew for sure.

  I found myself wondering ,though,how his morning had been. nWhat had been his last wards to his wife?To his children?To his friends?What had had done the day before?The week before?What had been his last contributions to his planet of ours and its people?

  I know thaat one day my body will be lying somewhere ,completely spiritless after I die.My hope is that when that  time comes,I won't be leaving many things left unsaid.I hope that I will have told the people I love that I love that I love them,and I hope that I will have told the people I love that I love them,and I hope that my last words to no one will have been word of anger or disocuragement,I hope that wven if today was my last day , my last words to anyone might have been words of wncouragement,love,and peace.

  I probably won't leave a great legacy of public works; I probably won't be at all in the public wye when I go , The people to whom my death will be positive and uplifting ,so that they may pass on those qualities to others in thier lives.And I hope that when I do go.I don't have tons of umfinished business,many things left unsaid,many tasks that matter to other people left undone.

  I found out the man's name in the newspaper the next day,but when all is said and done his name isn't the most important part of who he was.He was a human being who was here on this planet to be the best he could be,to give the most he could give .His time came when it came,just as ours will,and now he's gone.It's a rather sad irony that his last moment came just fifty feet from the finisn line of his last race,but wherever he is right now,I'msure he doesn't care--it may even be worth a laugh to him.His many years of life arre now over,and he has moved on.But he didn't fo without leaving a message,and a very important one:/

   Don't leave whithout having said the things you need to day or showing the love you ought to show.

And since none of us know when our time may come,it's very important that we live by this principle every day so that when we do die (and we will),we're able to move on with a bit of peace,knowing that we've done all we can and all we need to do.

   I'm pretty sure that when he got up that morning , he didn't know that he would be dead in a few hours.When the race began,I doubt that he knew that he would be dead in half an hour .If he had known,what might he have done differently with his last few days,or his last few hours?I want to learn to live so that when my time comes , i won't wish that I had done anything differently. If I can reach that point in my life,then my life will be much,much easier,and many more people will benefit much more from my presence in their lives.