Re: something that is permanent and meaningful ,..

at my age, i have accomplished most of what is on your list, no, maybe all of what is there. was it my goal when i was young? yes, very much so. but when you got to the part about, ''To build, write or paint something that is permanent and meaningful beyond my own death'', it gave me pause to think. In high school, I got serious about my art, working in different mediums. I painted in oils, acrylics, and watercolors. I sculpted in clay. I tried my hand in the printing arts, I worked with glue and paper and created a montage that got exhibited in the lobby of our school, along with everything else that I had created and the teacher was holding onto at the end of the school year. yeah, I was a one-man show on graduation day. I got to take everything home. strangely, I was not really proud of myself for any of that. I was more proud of the fact that I was practically teaching the whole class my senior year (this school only had a two year art program). what happened to all of that work? some years later, some random pyromaniac threw a Molotov cocktail on the roof of my parents' house and the house and all of my memories burned to the ground. years later, down on my luck, I tried supporting myself by selling my new artwork to the local perverts. my stuff sold quickly, as i created exactly what they asked for. you may run into my stuff sometime, but it isn't signed ''larry''. I don't have any idea if any of my work still survives, but most of the buyers are dead, now. I find, now in my dotage, that most of my best work is not of canvas, paper, or clay, but in what i have given of myself. I have worked with children (not as an academic, or any kind of professional, but as a private citizen) on the playing fields and in my own home. I have counseled boys who were troubled, lost, or virtually abandoned. I have worked in a food bank, at first it was all about the paycheck and the other benefits that they offered. but after a while, through interacting with the clients and seeing their needs, I was going in to work on Saturdays (my day off) to do work that could not be done through the week. I think that everything that I considered permanent, when i was young, is just fleeting. any change that anyone can make is only temporary. and if it is only temporary, we must make it as magnificent as we possibly can, so that it will be remembered for just a little bit longer.