On July 25th, I lost my dad. Time seemed to stop, though I know it cannot be stopped, stored, or added to. What I felt was a loss of time itself.
My dad knew exactly how valuable time could be.
The realization came slowly. My time is now left without parents. Dad measured time in what it taught him. He wore a watch every day — the one I gifted him, years ago. His schedule never depended on it. But he was always on time, out of respect.
I began looking at time differently. My past time. My current time. My future time. Each one asking something of me. Each day, he would say, is a gift.
“It’s a day wasted if you didn’t have time to learn something new.”
I am most proud of the times I faced difficulty — in relationships, in finances, in the choices I had to make. Another of his sayings stayed with me through all of it. Complaining, he told us, is depressing and a waste of time.
I met hard seasons without wasting them.
Time is limited. Once it’s gone, it cannot be recovered. It is the measure of our existence, and the choices we make within it shape who we were, who we are, and who we will become. Now I look at his watch each day, and I try to spend my time well.
Purposeful Time is how my father lived, and how I choose to carry him forward.