Last week, while I was attending morning worship at my church on Dec. 5, I was notified my younger brother, Jerry, had taken a turn for the worse and needed to be put on a ventilator. I quickly left the worship service to be with him and his immediate family. I remained close throughout his fight with COVID-19. He died Friday, Dec. 10. His wife Cris and I were at his side. Today I am sharing an adaptation of a column I wrote in 2010 about making our lives count.
That year I read something written by Tom Heymann, I am not sure who he is or where he found these facts, but they are certainly interesting. Heymann shared the average American during their life spends: $89,281 on 109,354 pounds of food, makes 1,811 trips to McDonald’s, eats 35,138 cookies, catches 304 colds, spends 13 years watching television, is in six auto accidents and sleeps almost 24 years.
As a 61-year-old, using Heymann’s estimates I have: spent $67,000 on 81,000 pounds of food, made 1,350 trips to McDonalds, enjoyed 26,350 cookies, suffered 230 colds, watched 9 3/4 years of television, been in five auto accidents and slept 18 years.
The only calculation I can easily measure is auto accidents, and I am just one behind Heymann’s estimates. Statistically, I have lived three-fourths of my life, living through the baby, child, young man, and middle age stages and now look forward to the “grandpa stage.”