SOUL. Celebration - Life and Death.

One of the first questions one Naturopath will ask the other: so, how did you find yourself into this type of medicine?

The short and brutal answer of my story: I watched too many family members die young when I was growing up. Cancer took most. I didn’t even get to meet my Dad’s parents. Or Uncle Jim. And watched Aunt Jan, Aunt Mary pass well before their expected life span. The question, how can we live longer and well, struck me as a child.

But this point of this post is one of celebration, and a reminder. Because in this knowing of death, I have found celebration of life to be so important. I am one of those people who likes to celebrate birthdays. To sing Happy Birthday loudly and very off-tune, but at least very enthusiastically. Cake, calls, cards, the day off of work … the whole shebang. I have seen too many people not reach their next expected birthday to not have this mentality. To age is not a right, it is a gift.

So, when my Dad turned 70 this September, we did it up big. He is the first Carr to make it to this age in two generation. His younger sister, my Aunt Mary, passed away about a year this time. She went quick and a bit unexpected, as it always feels, I suppose, but never got to see her 68th birthday. Or the retirement she worked her whole life for. So this post is dedicated to both of them, Peter Carr and Mary Carr, for both the life and death that we recognized this year in our family.

As part of the festivities for his 70th, my Dad and I did an overnight backpack in his beloved area of Meeker, Colorado in the Flattop Wilderness. It was a hike special to no one but us. My Dad had done it 50 years earlier while working as a wildland firefighter in the area, and his Dad did this same trail, as well. A sort of generational hike, with a swampy lake waiting for us at the top of the 2,000 ft climb in Colorado elevation.

At this time last year, when Aunt Mary started really declining, I could not shake the polarity of the older Carr sibling concurrent realities: my Dad was competing in tennis nationals and she was in the hospital with a broken hip, frail and literally asking to die. It was a potent reminder of the things that are in our control, as they both did live out their 60-s0me years quite differently.

In short, small, and likely already known advice from this year of celebration and grief:

Move your body daily.

Drink more pure water than pop, diet soda, energy drinks or juice.

Enrich your life with meaningful relationships / community.

Eat vitamin and mineral rich food sources.

Celebrate the little things. Like every birthday.

And to end with a quote I heard this past June, “So, when death comes to find you - and it will - I hope it finds you living.” - Kristin Hallett