Have Fun. I Did.

I heard a woman speak recently about her deceased husband.  During her remarks about him, she showed the audience a small notebook in which her husband had written down information about their finances and investments to help her after he was gone.  He only wrote in the first few pages, leaving the majority of the book blank.  On the last page of his writings, there were only four words written across the top: Have Fun. I Did.  Hearing those four simple words got me to thinking about how I live my life.  Will I be able to say at the end of it that I've had fun?  I certainly hope so.  Those words also made me think of a funny Steve Martin comedy skit from years ago. Martin said, while brilliantly playing his banjo, that the instrument just didn't lend itself to sad songs.  Then, he proceeded to try to sing one with dreary lyrics. The skit was hysterical and I recall laughing every time I heard it.  The question is:  How much do I sing that song instead of reciting the words that the husband had left as an enduring message for his wife?  As we live our lives and experience all that it has to offer -- some wonderful, some incredibly difficult, it's easy to cart around the banjo song's sad lyrics.  But I'm going to work very hard from now on to replace those words with Have Fun so that when it's all said and done, I'll be able to conclude it with I Did.