The Last Lecture

Well I just spent the last 45 minutes trying to keep my composure as I watched an ABC special about Randy Pausch who wrote "The Last Lecture". You have probably heard about this guy...he was a professor at Carnegie Mellon University and was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. He was already a mentor to many of his students and gave motivational speeches, but when he found out about the cancer he wrote his "last lecture" for his kids. It is full of advice on life and stories from his childhood. Some that stick out are "tell the truth, all the time", "a bad apology is better than no apology" and "wait to marry until you find someone that you care more about thier happiness than your own". He waited til he was 39 to marry and they have two boys and a girl..ages 6, 4 and 2. The thing that got me the most was that during his interview with Diane Sawyer he stopped her from ending the show and said "you forgot to ask me one question"..she said "what is that". He said "are they going to make my life into a movie"..and he said the answer was "No, because there isn't an actress out there pretty enough to play my wife"....talk about heartbreak. During the whole interview he and his wife kept looking at each other trying to savor each and every moment. They decided not to tell thier kids that daddy was sick until he was laying on his deathbed. That way they would match the word sick with how thier dad looked and they would understand it better. He wrote the last lecture for them, made videotapes for them all and left behind letters to be opened later on in each one of thier lives. He lived until May which was 6 months past the doctors expectations. In April he gave the commencement speech at Carnegie Mellon and at the end he wished everyone would find a love like he had...then he walked across stage and gave his wife a huge kiss...and picked her up and carried her off stage...one month away from dying, with fluid in his lungs and a failed kidney. On her last birthday with him alive his wife says she whispered in his ear "please don't die, because you will take all the magic with you". This is one of the best inspirational stories I have heard. I think we can learn alot about finding satisfaction in our lives, especially when things don't seem fair. The one thing that they didn't touch on was his religion...he wanted to keep that private. I wish that either (A) if he was a Christian he woud have talked about it and given a testimony that would have been so well recieved after watching his life and death or (B) that he would had left the message of Christ with his kids..since that is the most important thing a parent can pass on to thier kids. If you want to watch this special go to ABC.com...go to full episodes and then to "The Last Lecture: A Celebration of Life". I have to warn you though, get your kleenex out.