Just five minutes

(Something new this time! I have embedded an audio version of this entire story at the end of this email. Simply click on the arrow and you can hear yours truly read this week’s story to you. All in my thickly authentic Appalachian voice.)

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My friends, think of a loved one of yours who has passed on. What would you give to have just five minutes with them right now?

We don’t often think of five minutes as being a lot of time to do something meaningful in this world.

Ah, but it can be. It all depends on the context.

Five minutes can be a lot.

When I taught in public schools, I would make personal visits to the home of every student I taught. I had only two rules on these visits: 1 - Only say good things to the family about their child. 2 - Stay no more than five minutes.

On one home visit, a father who I believe truly loved his children told me, “Mr. Talley, I just can’t seem to find the time to be with my kids, to go to their ballgames and such. But it’s only because I love them so much. You see, I’m working overtime every chance I get,” he proudly told me. “I’m doubling up on my house payments. I want to get my family out of debt.”

The next time I laid eyes on this dear man was about a month later. He was all dressed up in a suit. He somehow found the time to lay in a coffin.

I believe this father truly loved his children. If he could come back from the dead, does anyone alive actually think he wouldn’t more greatly value any time spent with his children?

Unfortunately, I found that he was far from alone in his enormous misunderstanding of the value of time well spent.

On another home visit a single mother told me, “Mr. Talley, I spend every minute I possibly can after school with my child. We do so many wonderful things together.”

“That’s great to hear!” I replied. “What do you two do together?”

“Oh, so many wonderful things!” she told me. When I pressed her a bit more as to what were some of the wonderful things they did together, she quickly changed the subject to her new boyfriend.

Her child, a straight A student at the time, eventually got pregnant and ran away from home in high school.

I ran across this dear mother at a football game about that time. She told me, “Mr. Talley, I wish I could go back in time to when you visited our home. I didn’t really spend the time with my child that I told you I did. I see now what I did wrong. But it’s too late to do anything about it now.”

“Maybe it’s not too late,” I told her. “You have a new grandchild on the way. Every chance you get, spend time with that child. Even if it’s just five minutes.”

When my own son was a child, I made the time to tell him a quick, little made-up fun story every night. As in just five minutes or less. He will tell you I rarely missed a night. No matter how tired I was, I would drop by his bedroom and tell a bedtime story. Often we made the story up together. No matter what was going on, I made sure I found a few minutes.

When I taught at the Bristol Jail, one of the greatest ideas I believe I ever came up with was to get the men (when they returned to their homes) to promise to read each night with their young children. “Do it for just five minutes. That’s all it takes,” I told them. “That five minutes will change their life … and yours.”

Of all the things I tried at the jail - my idea to reconnect ex-jail inmates with their families - that idea may have topped them all. Of course, I often heard those “just five minutes” turned into much more. Sometimes much, much more. One dad told me he read with his daughter so far into the night that it nearly cost him his job the next morn, as he could hardly wake up.

Just five minutes can be a lot. Again, depending on the context.

In just five minutes we can call up a family member that we haven’t talked to in years.

In just five minutes we can order a special surprise gift online for a friend.

In just five minutes we can hug our pets, our significant other, and our children every day before we go to work - and again when we return home.

“I wish I’d spent less time with the people and pets I loved.” Said no one on their death bed. Ever.

And if none of us would say that while we’re dying … then why on Earth do so

many of us say it by how we live?