Take Care of Yourself

I never used to understand why people said, 'take care of yourself!' when they said goodbye.

Until last Tuesday.

Last Tuesday, I unexpectedly ran into an older friend of mine that I hadn't seen in several months. Of course, I was delighted and we had a little chat and I gave her a big hug and we went our separate ways. But the incident got me really thinking.

Now, it's more than possible that my friend may just have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed that morning. But I remembered her as a healthy, put-together person with a great sense of humor and a positive, productive outlook on life and that was not the vibe she was putting out when I saw her then. She looked tired, she had dark circles under her eyes, and she seemed to have aged years since I had seen her.

I know that we all get old and we all get tired, and if she was just having a bad day, hopefully I added some sunshine to it. But honestly I was worried. I spent the rest of the day wondering if she was sick or unhappy or if she needed more help; she has few family members in the area and most of her close friends are getting older. I wondered if I should call and offer to help with some cleaning or something.

I wondered all of that because I care. She's my friend and I love her. As I thought back over our conversation, I realized that when I said goodbye, I had smiled and said, 'take care of yourself, now!' And I'd really meant it. I really want her to wear the colorful clothes I know she enjoys so much and I really do want her to savor her coffee in the morning and go for a short walk in the fresh air and to make sure she goes to all her doctors appointments and I want her to call me or someone if she does need help with something she can no longer do on her own.

The reality is that I've got a very full, busy life right now and although I would put in the effort to do whatever I could if she needed help, there's not a lot that I am able to do for anyone more right now. But I care about her and I want her to take care of herself. For me. For herself. For everyone who cares about her.

And then after I realized that, I realized that I needed to take care of myself like that too. Sometimes I get so caught up in everything on my to do list that I get sort of paralyzed and I forget to take care of myself. To live. I forget to savor my coffee and to go for short walks myself and to read books and to take my little brothers and sisters to the library and camping in the woods. I forget to weed flower gardens so I have something pretty around the place and I forget that I need to remember to take pictures of things that make me happy and to work on good habits in my life and to keep growing and working on things.

Somebody cares about you. And you care about you because you have to live with you-you have to be you. So, take care of yourself, please. Make sure you get lots of sleep and eat some vegetables and spend some time outside. Make sure you are learning something and laughing every day and getting hugged lots. (The most surefire way to make sure you get hugged is to give hugs, just FYI.) If you're not happy, if you're in a rut, if you're out of touch with the people you care about, do something about it. It's not something that's going to work itself out.

This is your life, this is you. So take care of yourself. :)