ONLY the Present Are We Guaranteed

Sometimes in the mornings when I am reflecting while sitting in a reclining chair in the living room or outside on our back porch in a seasonal chair, I think about my past...  and, the more I think about what I have done with my life, the details of that past are not readily available in my mind, only the larger milestones through which I have passed like:

1. high school
2. college
3. military
4. marriages
5. employers
6. doctors
7. travel
8. funerals

My father and mother died in 2001 and 2015 respectively but I do not remember all that much about their funerals except my brother reading a 40 minute dissertation illuminating our father's accomplishments but any specifics of that list have failed to remain inside my brain.

Sometimes, I am not even sure what I did yesterday or the day before although I know I did something because I still have the task list on my calendar.

I remember that I had a Prostate Biopsy but I do not remember driving there nor do I remember driving home sitting next to my wife because I was not allowed to drive for 24 hours.

And...  as I have said before...  the past is gone forever and never will return...  not even the sip of coffee that I took took from my YETI cup...  that sip is now in my past and I will never experience what happened again unless I have a vivid imagination.

The only past that we actually experience in our present is the feeling of the warmth of the sun that took 7 or 8 minutes to get here once it left the sun.

So, what's the point of fretting over the past since it is all said and done...  we have only our immediate future which unfolds in nanoseconds of activities, each of which pass to freely by or at least that is what it seems to me.

How long did I sit and ponder moments ago?

How long did I gaze off into nothingness?

Why can I not remember what just happened to me?

How long does my present last?