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Three funerals in four weeks. A friend taken by bowel cancer. Another by a stroke. A third, most heartbreakingly of all, by his own hand. It’s got me thinking about life. The big questions no longer feel abstract; they feel like they’re sitting across the table, waiting.
So. Do you have any regrets about the choices you made in your younger years?
As the song goes, I have a few. Not spending more time with my daughters while they were growing up. Not making more of the time with my dad before he passed at just 64. Though I suspect parent guilt is something most of us carry, no matter how present we actually were.
Surprisingly, I have absolutely no regrets about our spending choices. There’s a strong financial argument that my wife Suzie and I were frivolous, spending far too much on travel in our younger years. Before kids, we travelled extensively: far-flung destinations that took real planning, including months on the road on extended unpaid leave. When the girls came along, we recalibrated rather than stopped. Three foreign trips a year became the norm, kept within five hours of home.
All of this cost a “lot” of money that a sensible young couple might have saved instead. We could undoubtedly have entered retirement wealthier. But the gifts you send your future self have to be balanced against the gift of actually living now. Deferring joy, deferring experience, deferring “life” is not without its dangers.
Too many of my peers have been stopped in their tracks far too soon. Cancer. Multiple sclerosis. One friend paralysed after a car crash, and he’s among the fortunate ones. Others haven’t made it at all. Then there are those still here, but whose freedom has been consumed by caring for an ageing parent or a seriously ill partner. It deepened my belief that living solely for some future version of yourself, banking everything on plans that may never unfold as imagined, is simply wrong. Balance is everything.
I’ll admit I may have had it easier than most in striking that balance. Travelling the way we did while still buying a home young and contributing to pensions was a fortunate position, and I 100% recognise it. But the principle applies regardless of circumstance. Putting life on hold until some more responsible future moment carries real risk, one my friend group knows all too well.
The future isn’t guaranteed. We need to live now, fully and deliberately, while also taking our future selves seriously. Not one or the other. Both, at the same time.
Perhaps that’s the real lesson hiding in plain sight within my own regrets. The things I wish I’d done differently have nothing to do with money or travel. They’re about presence: time with my daughters I can’t get back, conversations with my dad that never happened. No financial planning could have fixed either. They simply needed me to show up and choose the moment over everything else clamouring for my attention.
So when I look back with no regrets about the spending, I don’t think it’s really about the travel at all. It’s about the fact that Suzie and I chose to live, fully and deliberately, without endlessly waiting for a more sensible time. We got that part right. I just wish I’d applied the same thinking a little closer to home. Inflation doesn’t erode your memories, and it costs nothing to be present.
I don’t currently have regrets of the type you are speaking of. I may get on my deathbed someday and wish I had done more of this or that, but anticipating that isn’t going to cause me to do any of those things now, so I must not want them badly enough.
I hear you. This reminds me of something that occurred with my in-laws. They were retired and lived on the east coast, near the ocean. G’s father was a birder and enjoyed walks in the woods. Her mother, not so much but she enjoyed the ocean views.
Bill spoke periodically of seeing the Columbia River Gorge in Washington state, but it seemed it would never happen. Then G’s mother told us they were going to travel to LA. She had been invited to an event for playwrights.
I decided this was an opportunity, discussed it with G and I roughed up a travel itinerary to get them to the Gorge. They would take a train from LA to San Francisco. We would fly in, pick them up in an SUV and travel by vehicle. We discussed as a group and they agreed.
I then planned a daily itinerary with daily driving distances, stops along the way, places to stay and so on. We would travel north through California, stopping by the National Parks and Bodie ghost town. Then to the Columbia River and east toward The Dalles, OR for a short visit with a relative. We would return via the Oregon coast and the Pacific Coast Highway, stopping at lighthouses because Bill was a fan. I made all of the necessary reservations.
As the time approached there were some serious fires in California, and the price of gasoline went above $5 a gallon. It was tempting to cancel the trip, but I approached it as a “once in a lifetime event”. I carefully researched the fire situation and decided to persevere.
Bill’s health was becoming tenuous, but they decided to go to LA as planned and so we did the entire trip, as planned. In fact, he amazingly climbed many of the circular stairs in the lighthouses. The trip was more than what was expected and everyone had a wonderful time. I took thousands of photos, sometimes irritating G. From these we created an amazing DVD, set to music.
The pertinent thing is this. We didn’t know it, but this was Bill’s one opportunity. Not long after, Bill’s health further declined and he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s, moved into a care facility for the remainder of his life.
What are wonderful thing to do and a priceless memory.
What a wonderful gift you provided to your father in-law!
Mark, sorry to hear that you’ve lost so many people close to you lately.
The only regret that I contemplate from time to time is wondering if I put too much of my time and energy to work, leaving too much to my wife in raising our family and running the house. With the benefit of hindsight, everything worked out OK and I could have worked less. But at the time there were mortgages to pay off, all the expenses of kids and the worry of saving for retirement in some distant future.
I’ve been very fortunate that Cindy did such a magical job guiding our family forward, and that I managed to have very good relationships with our girls. But I certainly tested the limits at times.
Greg. A good partner in life certainly helps smooth the journey.
Regrets? Yes, of course. Some are huge and others are inconsequential. Can I do anything about them? Nope! The best I can do is move on with the lessons learned. Experience is a great teacher. I’m glad you are happy with the end result of your choices. I am, too.
Jeff, experience is indeed a great teacher, never a truer word spoken. It brings to mind that old saying, and as a proud Irishman I’m delighted to claim it: youth is wasted on the young — words attributed to the great George Bernard Shaw, one of my own country men.
Mark, I am sorry for your recent losses. Your post spoke to me in that Spouse and I really need some time away from all that has been going on with our families. Things are a little better now, but it is still so easy to be sucked in. I never thought our retirement would be like this. Chris
Chris, thank you for your kind words. I’ve always held to this belief: loss is the price we pay for the privilege of loving and caring for others. You’ve had a hard start to retirement — but I’m sure brighter days are ahead.
Mark, I appreciate your encouraging words very much. Chris
Many of the choices I made in the past were less than ideal, both financial and interpersonal. I could have done much better in so many ways.
But I also know that in general I did the best I could, constrained by who I was at the time, certainly far less than perfect.
One of my main goals in life has been to recognize where I fall short and try to learn from that and move a little closer to where I’d like to be. And to give myself grace when I don’t get there as fast as I’d like to.
We all need a lot more grace in our life.
Forgiving ourselves — or at least shrugging and moving past old mistakes — is a true mark of coming to peace with who we are. It’s a destination not everyone reaches.
Boy, that’s a tough four weeks, Mark. Thanks for sharing your contemplations, they certainly hit home for me.
Dan. Losing someone close always brings home what’s important in life.
“It’s about the fact that Suzie and I chose to live, fully and deliberately…”
Thoreau is my favorite early American literature author, and Walden is my favorite book of his. I have been to Walden pond several times as it is only 1 1/2 hours from my home.
This is what he wrote was his reason to go to the woods, “to “live deliberately”—to front only the essential facts of life, examine its true meaning, and avoid the realization upon dying that I had not truly lived.
He has many other quotes in the book that also spoke to me as a teenager, and are still true today.
David, there’s a strange truth to living, in the moment, you’re simply doing what you think is best. It’s only later, looking back, that the patterns and choices begin to reveal themselves, and the pieces finally arrange into a coherent whole.
Mark, I’m very sorry to hear about the passing of your friends. We lost a good friend earlier this year, and we have several family member and close friends facing challenging illnesses. Having family and friends you love is a blessing, but it inevitably means we will lose someone we love. I hope you find peace and solace in the memories of good friends.
Rick, I really appreciate your reply — and the wisdom it carries. Your voice is genuinely missed around here. Your articles and responses were always among my favourites, even on the occasions when the maths pushed my limits. I hope you’re keeping well.