I was finishing my haircut while the stylist beside me prepared to leave and begin arrangements for her father's calling hours and memorial service. I commented on the hard loss of a parent, and she replied, "Yes--and my father was amazing." She held out a small booklet and said, "Would you like to look at what he wrote about himslef and his life?"
While there was not time for me to read the entire book, I was fascinated and intrigued by what he wrote, and what prompted a man in his eighties to chronicle the wonderful events and thoughts I found in those pages. And then I found it. He explained himself. He said a number of years ago he heard a speaker challenge people to "leave an ethical legacy, by life and by word." This speaker said that people should record for their children and succeeding generations a clear record of how they lived, what they believed, and why.
What a wonderful idea! What a wonderful man! If you want to read about him, his family summarized a very full life eloquently in the Akron Beacon Journal. You can find his obituary under R. Wayne Duff at http://www.legacy.com/ohio/Obituaries.asp?Page=SearchResults.
How about you? I want to live a life so amazingly clean, attractive, and inspiring that people will wonder what was behind it all. For the answers I want to make sure they understand, I needto get writing.
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