Last night, I was playing 21 questions with a new friend. We only got to question 3 before it got late, but she gave me the question and told me she was going to sleep and that she'd read and reply as well as give her answer in the morning. I told her I'd forget in the morning, but that I'd wait a while and send my answer after I was sure she was asleep. After an hour, I started typing. By the time I finished, it had been almost an hour and the text was 4,147 characters long.
You might think that's ridiculous. Gasp or speak the words, "Teenagers these days..." with an unsubtle hint of horror/judgement and a wave of your hand. But to me? It wasn't. For me, it was a wonderful reminder and chance to reflect on what is truly important to me.
The question? "How would you spend the last day of your life?"
So without further ado:
"How I'd Spend the Last Day of My Life"
by Cassidy Taylor Capen
"I'm not quite sure if you mean if someone told me I had 24 hours left on this planet or something else. I suppose it doesn't matter if I'm conscious of the fact that it's my last...
While there is a very large part of me that would like to attempt to cross off as many things on my bucket list as I possibly could, I think that's quite foolish. The victory would be short-lived and who's to say I would even remember it? It's meaningless. I would cross off one thing, two tops. Preferably one with a family member or someone truly special. I wouldn't dedicate more than 2 hours to it though.
After that, I would gather up my close family and friends and go speed grocery shopping. Get all of my favorite foods and stuff! I'd want to be done in 45 minutes or less!
In hours 3-9 I would steal a school bus and all of us get on and drive up to our time share in Stowe, Vermont and (unless it was week 42 or the last week of august) pay them to give us a place for the day. (Now you may think this is a waste. Why not home? Well, a) The 5.5 hours in a school bus. No one can leave or get up. I could have everyone right there. We could sing stupid songs and have fun! B) I love Stowe. C)It's smaller than my house. See a. D)I have to steal something, right? Plus, that plays in later!)
So once we were all settled in we'd spend the time playing board games and sharing stories and eating all the crap food I wanted because who cares if I gain a thousand pounds? We'd have a dance party and sing mic-less karaoke and laugh until we peed our pants. Then, when it got down to 4-5 hours, I'd take a super snappy shower (2 minutes!) and get in my comfiest clothes or steal someone else's.
I'd spend the first 30 or so minutes with my best friend telling her all the things I want her to do for me and all the things I love about her and how grateful for her I am. Then, I'd make a phone call to someone who wouldn't be there...(or maybe she would) and tell her a bunch of stuff she already knows. Mainly, that I love her. Then I'd do the same with my girlfriend if I had one, if not I'd go straight my dad. And then my mom. And I'd talk to her until I had just 1 hour left. At which point I would go and say goodbye to everyone there aside from my mom, dad, step-dad, brother, best friend, ____ if she was there and my girlfriend if I had one. For the remainder of the time, I would cuddle up in the master suite with the people I love most and just talk, laugh, cry and tell everyone what I want them to do with my body etc. and tell them I love them until I drifted off. (I'd tell them I wanted to be cremated. That I'd want my ashes to be divided in half and then one half set aside. That I'd want the first half to be divided into 4 equal parts for the four elements- Earth, Wind, Fire and Water. The first, water, I'd want thrown into the North Atlantic from Plymouth, Mass. The second, wind, I'd want to be thrown up into the wind at the top of our mountain in Stowe, Vermont. The third, earth, I'd want to have a some trees and flowers planted in Munich, Germany and I'd want them to be in with the soil there. And last, fire, I'd want to be sent up in fireworks off of the Seven Seas Lagoon beach at the Polynesian Resort in Disney World. With the other half of my ashes, I'd tell them to divide them into two parts. One part to be given in urns to whomever wanted them and the other part to be put in an urn which I'd want buried at a cemetery and topped with a basic headstone, just so people have a place they could come to to talk to me if they needed to. I think thats healing and aside from the personal urns, it would be the only tangible place I actually was.)
After that, everyone would probably stay there or something, I'm not sure. But eventually they'd all have to take the bus back to the 5.5-6 hours to my house. I think that would be good for everyone to be together. I hope they wouldn't cry though. Just laugh."
I apologize for spelling, grammatical and punctuation errors. It was typed on an iPhone between 115 and 210am and I didn't proofread it before sending it either to it's rightful recipient or my email. And I wasn't going to do it now. The only thing I bothered to change was a name: ____. But you get the gist. :)
Maybe it was silly. Maybe I should have been sleeping. Maybe my "plans" will change. But I am quite grateful that she asked the question that she did. I desperately needed the reminder that answering it provided. The reminder that things aren't as bad as they sometimes seem. That a lot of my worries are, in the end, irrelevant.
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