Truth is I have never made a mix tape. Sadly, I never received one either. With as many times as my trusty little heart has been crushed, you’d think at least one tape would have made it into my cassette player. Having a sad mix tape would have come in handy for those inevitable “It’s not you, It’s me” chats that seemingly worked their way into my early relationships. Amazingly, I survived young adulthood and found someone who wanted to warm my heart instead and we will celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary earlier this year.
I marvel at the unbelievable technological innovations coming our way. Incredibly, researchers are now developing “life-logging systems” that continuously stream video from a body-worn camera for those who want to routinely record their life’s events for future use. Within our lifetimes, these life-logging systems could lead to the possibility of human memories and personalities being uploaded to a computer and downloaded to a new body.
While the whole new body thing is a bit creepy, being able to turbo charge your memory banks seems intriguing. In the final weeks of my dad’s life, we were grateful for the miracles of modern science that made his suffering manageable. He passed peacefully with his loving family around him, having lived an incredibly full life. While I am not ready to go anytime soon, when my time does come, the notion of a “final playlist” full of my favorite memories would be pretty cool to view as I slipped off to the great beyond.
So what would be in my final playlist? To be sure there would be heartfelt segments of my family. Those gathered around would recognize the mixture of joy and happiness sweeping across my face as I viewed those clips. Maybe a “Top 10” list would be cool—those really important accomplishments that I managed to pull off wouldn’t be too hard to watch. Hopefully that segment wouldn’t be too short and those in the audience would sense my contentment. I will probably pass making an “Oops” segment—would take too much time to watch anyway. Besides, I will have plenty of time to answer for that on the other side.
My final observers may be confused by a certain segment—the one simply entitled “Epic”. The Epic clip will involve my mountain bike, my riding bros and some of God’s most beautiful creations as a backdrop. To be clear, my Epic clip is certainly not as important as say, my family segment. However, it will be critical that I am securely fastened to my gurney because I am positive my aged body will lurch to and fro in an attempt to be one with the bike again. The fool-crazy grin and outstretched index finger frantically searching for the replay button will be a dead giveaway that I am in the Epic zone.
For now, I am content to hang out here as long as possible while those engineers crank away at perfecting the technology needed to make my final playlist a reality. Meanwhile, I will work on perfecting the footage of my final playlist to the best of my abilities. Hopefully, between now and then somebody will give me an awesome mix tape to serve as the soundtrack.
