A Race Against Time

Though I grow old, though I become ill, though the endurance of youth has been traded unequally to the years, I find yet that I have just barely begun in life. I find myself, much surprised, not with paced gait on the final turns, but back under the starting gun, still in the blocks, anxious, pressed, and most of all impatient. Everything to this point had been training, had been practice, and now the real race is about to begin.

I look back and realize that my life has been a serious of false starts. I find that I often ran blindly, or ran without confidence, or ran without poise. There were times when the finish line was not worth the race, and there were times when my effort was not equal to the goal.

And so I begin again--though this time, this last time, the course to be run has changed. It is shorter, it it straighter, and its limits are not only of length, but of time.

It is a race against time. But time to do what?

Something, anything, everything.

There are a million things to do, a million people to meet, a million places to see, a million ends to be tied and a million knots to be freed. I have wasted far too much time, not knowing how short time would turn out to be.

And yet I could not until now have run with the same assurance, an assurance of good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over. To take, at this point, the merest thing for granted would seem a luxury open only to the young and the well.

One thing more about the course shall I mention. There is not now a single competitor to be seen. No, not one; though there be countless companions by my side.