Life is intense? say what??!!!

Well, you were the dull sound of sharp math
When you were alive
No one's gonna play the harp when you die
And if I had a nickel for every damn dime
I'd have half the time, do you mind? ...

And it's our lives
It's hard to remember, it's hard to remember
We're alive for the first time
It's hard to remember we're alive for the last time
It's hard to remember ...
to live before you die ...
that are lives are such a short time ...
When it takes such a long time - Modest Mouse (Lives)

So why am I so intense to live life?

Because it is such a short time, because this is my first time and for all I know my last time. I've watched as people around me die. I've had to look into my father's face as he lay on a hospital bed, tubes bending from his arms and a oxygen mask over his face. And when I forget, someone else dies and I'm reminded.

So, it is not the fear of death. It is the fear I have that I will not LIVE before I have to go. I want to climb the tallest mountains. I want to visit distant lands. I want to help anyone and everyone I can. I want a family, and I want to make one woman the happiest she has ever been. I want to fall madly in love and build something beautiful.

Someone suggested in an e-mail I shouldn't be so intense about life. But I am young, and I say that is what life is all about. Let me cringe when I am bored. Let me sit mournfully when I have no prospects of a great adventure. Life to me is a vast and amazing journey.

I will be intense. I will not give up a single second of it.