Legacy

I've been thinking a great deal about the idea of leaving behind a legacy.   Blame it on an adventurous lifestyle or all the close calls I've had this year..  (I'm looking at you Rome),  but my mind just won't let the thought go.   
I know what a legacy is...  at least what I've been taught to believe about one.   That part of your existence that you leave behind, for your family, for your kids, for people following.    I know that politicians talk about leaving legacy and I know we admire great men who have "etched their legacy" into the history books through action and with sheer determination.     But recently I've been given the chance to re-evaluate my own terms of "legacy".. to abandon the lofty disconnect I've always associated with it..  and to truly ask myself,  what is of importance to me?    Or a better question....  who am I already?  

The, "who am I already?"  question... that struck a chord in me.    When you ask yourself that question, you also have to answer:  "What do I do?"     And not in a typical, work-related, bullshit sterile sense..   but organically,  naturally,  completely..   WHAT THE HELL DO I DO?     What do I talk about?   Where do I go?   What do I eat?   What makes me laugh?  Who do I adore?   Where are my dreams?    What are my habits?
 I think that a legacy is something that we are all building... some of us are intent about leaving a very specific one behind..    some of us could care less.     But perhaps...legacy.. the version that I desire, is not about manufacturing an image for the world to treasure once we're gone..  but more about leaving behind and essential-ness,  a quality that is so fundamentally us that we never even knew we were becoming it.    My perception of leaving a legacy... is becoming personal, human, intimate...  real.    
Thinking about people I admire,  or people that I remember,  many times it isn't their greatness or their towering achievements that stand out in my mind...  but rather their nobility, strength and passion played out through simple actions.  Practices of living that, over time, have become deeply associated with their character and presence.

I remember the way my dad's arms felt after he cut down trees with his chainsaw...  every Saturday I remember the earthy, rugged scent and the coarseness of the shavings caught in the black curls of his beard.  I remember the way drips of sweat left trails down his dirt covered forearms. 

I remember my grandpa's pipe tabacco..  watching him nimbly, expertly push it into place... watching him flick open his silver Zippo lighter with the eagle emblem,  and light that sucker up...  puff puff puff.. then the grin - the twinkle in the eyes.

These are very simple things.  The actions of men who were just doing what they loved..  over and over.    It isn't some great deed or single magnificent event that defined them... it was the action that they were least aware of..  the one they did all the time just because it was so wildly and intimately part of their essence.   
  I like that.    I like that version of Legacy.
   



Andrew Tipton