The American golfer Sam Bennett looks at his arm before every swing. On it, there is a tattoo which reads: ‘Don’t wait to do something‘. They were the final written words of his father Mark who died of Alzheimers Disease in 2021 and they are inked on exactly as they were written. It makes you think, doesn’t it?
Even though his father is dead, Sam says the tattoo gives him a permanent connection with him. He says: “It’s like a new pre-shot routine I do now, right before I’m about to hit it I’ll look at it and I’m like, ‘don’t wait to do something.’ It’s something that will always stick and he means the world to me.”
The thought behind ‘Don’t wait to do something’ resonates with many of us. The loss of loved ones brings home the reality of our own mortality and that’s certainly something I’ve thought long and hard about in recent times. I’ve seen dreams fade and die, tragically unfulfilled, and through it all I’ve thought this could easily have been me.
If my parents are anything to go by, I’ve probably got between 10 and 16 years left before I slip off my mortal coil. It could be less, it could be more, but either way, in every way and every day, time is running out.
Some things I may never be able to afford. That all inclusive holiday in the Maldives, that villa holiday in Tuscany, a round of golf on one of the legendary golf courses – they’re not all going to happen but I’ve decided that for now heaven can wait.
I’ve waited to see my family in Canada for too long and I am putting that right in the autumn. I have promised myself a solo trip to Rotterdam, a whole week to get in touch with my heritage and I’m doing that, too. I’ve wanted to go to places like the Manchester Airport visitors centre as well as train spotting at Shap Summit. To repeat for the umpteenth time, the saddest words in the world are what if. What if I got to my death bed and had all these regrets? I wish I’d played Bridport and West Dorset Golf Club but I kept putting off over and over again until I was too elderly and frail? I wish I’d been to Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg, the world’s largest model railway, but I never got round to it. What if is not something I want to be thinking about before I die. If I am not careful it will be too late.
Don’t wait to do something. Sam Bennett’s father got that right and now I have to make sure I don’t wait, either.
