Learning to let go should be learned before learning to get.  Life should be touched, not strangled. You’re got to relax; let it happen at times, and at others move forward with it.

Ray Bradbury

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Alas we spend a life time grasping, getting, collecting, holding, storing, saving, accumulating.

Attics fill.  Garages become crammed with possessions, not autos.

Then aging appears.

Near the end you realize: I have gotten, but you ask: Have I touched?

Oh, yes, you remember those moments, those times when you touched life, felt its texture and thrilled at its joy.  At the closing you come to desire nothing so much as to touch those things that last, that give the greatest joy, that speak the truest word.

Time with your grandchildren, your friends, your son, his family.  Touching-time. Time in quiet to be with the world at it twists and wiggles like a newborn.  Touch. Time gazing at the clouds.  How they float and slowly and form and reform in the wind.  Or how they gather in gray to give us caution, hasten us to shelter.  Yes, in gazing we touch.

Memories of yesterday and those who filled our path.  Touch.  Memories of love now at rest.  Touch.

After decades we gain touch.  With the pile of the years, we cannot strangle anything anymore.  Touch.  With age touch prevails – our hearts more like a child’s small fingers – tender, gentle, alive to the touch.

In age comes “the settling time.”  It befits touch.  The letter that needs writing. The voice that must be heard one more time.  The words that must be spoken. The scene that must be witnessed one more time.  The embrace that must pass to us, must be given by us.  Touch.

In time we let life happen, and move forward with it.  Touch.  Yes, life touches us and we receive its touch.

In age we feed on touch, are nourished by it.  We touch best when we let go.

Shalom.