There’s this one thing that my Uncle Billy said to me about two weeks ago. It was after my grandma’s funeral. We were sitting on the couch, watching the game, eating chopped liver. We were talking about, I dunno, the Broncos or the chopped liver, probably. Doesn’t really matter now.
But somewhere along the line, Uncle Billy dropped this bit of life advice, and it’s stuck with me: “You get one swing.”
Uncle Billy’s 88 years old. He went to war, married a girl he loved, went fishing more times than anyone else I know, showed up for every birthday and bar mitzvah I can remember. As far as Great-uncles go, he’s been a pretty stellar one.
I’ve heard that bit of advice before, obviously. It’s there on fortune cookies. It’s there in self-help books. Hell, there are people at my office who’ve worn YOLO T-shirts before. (Ironically, but still.)
But none of that quite carries the weight that it does when it comes from someone like your 88-year-old Great-uncle, does it? (And at a funeral, no less!)
One swing. Just go for it.
Alright, Uncle Billy, here goes.
That photo of a golfer comes via Flickr’s Nick Jewell.