GEEKOLOGY 101: Hope to see you guys next week...

So my mind has been spinning since the last time we met and I really don’t know which way I want to go with this column.

I don’t feel like being funny or glib. What I do feel like doing is curling up into a ball with my kids close and retreating from this world that became so much darker in just a short week.

You all, of course, know what happened between then and now that has caused me to lose a little part of my heart this week, the massacre in Connecticut.

Now I am not going to go all preachy on you or spew out some long rant about the need for gun control.

There has been enough of that on the news and in so many Facebook posts, that I am pretty sick of the discussion.

That is all too political for me anyway. I don’t cover that beat.

What I am going to say is that my heart broke when I heard those choice few that questioned the President’s speech and the validity of his tears that he wiped away as he addressed the media shortly after the tragedy.

This man is a dad before he is the President. To question that a dad would not see his own children in the faces of those cut down so early in life is to say that he has no soul.

Though some of you would question that too.

For me, I held my boys close that day and cried many tears and I am sure that the President did as well.

Anyway...moving on.

I just don’t want to spend all my time on the Connecticut tragedy. Mainly because I don’t want to start bawling at work. It is still too fresh in my heart.

So on to something else.

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So according to the Mayan calender, this is my last column because the world will end tomorrow.

Do I believe that? Not in the slightest but apparently many in this world do.

Let’s just say, though, that it did end on Friday. That life as we know it would just end.

How would you spend your last day on Earth? Who would you spend it with? 

For me, that question is easy to answer. I would spend it playing games with my wife and kids. In the background you could hear popping of popcorn with movies playing on the television.

That is how I would like to spend my last day because it would encompass everything I love in this world. My kids, My wife, movies and board games.

We would pray, we would play, we would laugh and we would cry. That would be a great memory to end this world with.

I don’t need to spend it chasing down a dream of what could of been. I don’t have to spend it running over regrets of the past.

I would just enjoy what I have and revel in how good my life is, even as it would end.

Of course, since I don’t believe that the world is going to end on Friday, which would ruin my friend Dan’s birthday, what is stopping me from spending the rest of my days, many or few, from doing that anyway?

Actually there is nothing that should. We all spend our lives looking forward and backwards that we sometimes forget about what is going on in the present.

So those of you that think the world is going to end, look around you and find out what is important to you and spend time in that. Don’t go crazy, just enjoy what you have.

Then the next day, when reality sets in, enjoy what you have again and again. You found out what is important in your life now revel in it and don’t let a day go by wasting time doing it.

Because you never truly know when your last day will be on this Earth.

Those kids that went to school that day didn’t. Those parents didn’t know that this would be the last moment with those they love.

Cherish your life, my friends, don’t live in regret. I am not going to anymore, neither should you.

Gary Darling is the geekiest employee at the Maryville Daily Forum. His email is: gdarling@maryvilledailyforum.com. Drop him a line sometime!