Plea to seniors: enjoy life now

Hundreds of University students can see the light at the end of the tunnel, as graduation day swiftly approaches.

Some are arriving at their educational destinations – bachelor’s degrees – and then must choose which fork in the road will take them farther down their career paths.

Others may choose to wander the streets of academia a bit longer, as they seek master’s or doctorate degrees.

I send congratulations to all graduates, nearly 800 of you, for a job well done. You should be extremely proud of yourselves.

As I have told my daughters multiple times, “If it were easy to get a college degree, then everyone would have one.”

In addition, always remember this: If you realize in years to come you have chosen the wrong path, it’s never too late to return to college and choose a different path.

I did and so have many others.

But whatever path you choose, make sure you remember to enjoy the journey along the way.

You see, we are all born with our own individual expirations dates, and yours may be closer than you think, as no one is guaranteed a tomorrow.

These are not just empty words, for I speak from personal experience.

My youthful college days ended with my obtaining an MRS degree instead of an academic one, and I was very happy with my choice.

At the time, I wasn’t driven to succeed in a career. Looking back, I believe this was due partly to the fact I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do.

So for the first seven years of my marriage, I eagerly worked at a few odd jobs: sales clerk, cashier, assembly-line production worker, newspaper-layout designer and bank bookkeeper.

During this time, my husband and I basically worked and saved our money for the future, taking time for only one vacation.

Then I became a mother at 28 – a little later than most women of my generation – with the birth of my daughter Ashley. I retired to become a full-time mom, and three years later, my daughter Tracie was born.

I love being a mom. I believe it’s the most rewarding job in the world and at the same time one of the hardest. Kids don’t come with instructions, you know, and you can’t give them back!

Anyway, my husband and I postponed many things we really wanted to do until our kids were older. For example, we didn’t take the girls out to eat at nice restaurants for fear of their getting fussy or loud or having a temper tantrum, as some kids do. We never went on a vacation because they hated long car rides – an hour and a half was their limit.

Five years later, my husband Tom, 40, was diagnosed with throat cancer. Afterward he bravely endured six weeks of radiation treatments, a laryngectomy and complete neck dissection and six more weeks of radiation treatments, only to have the cancer return.

His doctors told us there was nothing else they could do, giving him six months to live. He only lived six more weeks, dying from an external hemorrhage of the carotid artery almost one year from the date of his cancer diagnosis.

If I had known at 21 that I would have been a widow at 38, I would have done so many things differently.

Please don’t put your lives on hold waiting for the perfect time or a more convenient time to do something you really want to do. Whatever it is, just do it.

Enjoy your life.

I wish I had because I missed out on so many things, so many memories.