A Life less Lived

I wrote a will when I was 34. I felt that I had to since I was on my second wife and I had two kids from my first matrimonial horror show.

One person in the billions all over the world might be particularly bored and might ask, why was I considering my own mortality at that age? Well, the answer is that I was about to fly for the first time – and I’m terrified of flying. I was convinced there was a 50/50 chance that I was going fall from the sky in a huge fireball, and I had responsibilities.

Before you start judging me, saying how silly I am for thinking I might die, I would ask that you look at the statistics. They show that the majority of people die over the age of 30. I was 34, so I was already living on borrowed time. Yeah – I don’t sound like such a poof now, do I? Fuckin’ ‘ave it.

Anyway, I didn’t need to put my new wife in the will because she was coming with me. It was her fault I was embarking on a 12-hour nightmare to Japan because I was going to meet her family before we got married.

So, everything I had was to be split evenly between my two daughters. Right then; pen in hand, I started a list of everything I owned. What bounty was I going to bestow upon my progeny following my demise?

A house…? No; it was rented.

A car…? No; it was a mobility car because I’m disabled.

Money in the bank; or life assurance…? Nope; I spent so much time overdrawn that my bank had started charging me for red ink.

I was actually beginning to sweat by now. I’d been on this planet for 34 years, and in that time, what had I accrued to provide a legacy for my children?

Er…I had a fairly decent home cinema system and a big telly. Every studio album Queen ever made. A VHS collection that was rapidly becoming worthless because DVDs were taking over. A burgeoning DVD collection. An obscenely large collection of books. A bit of furniture. A nice pocket watch that was more of sentimental value than financial. A (single) wardrobe full of mid-value clothes. Half a dozen stamps I’d bought for 20p each and which had doubled in value.

In real terms, I had fuck-all. Fuck-all to show for my 34 years meandering around this planet.

I was depressed. I felt like a failure. Then I thought about my kids. They grew up in a nice home where they were loved. They always had nice clothes and full stomachs. They had every toy or game they ever wanted; every video or DVD. They weren’t beaten or abused. They were encouraged and built up rather than knocked down. They asked for something and they got it; I spent all my money on them – I was never one for saving. I played with them, spent time with them; I was silly for them; strong for them; I comforted them when they needed it; left them alone when they wanted it.

I tried to be a good dad.

So, why do I still feel like a failure?