I Believe In Living Everyday to the Fullest - By Robert Sandoval

Robert Sandoval is an Iraqi war veteran trying to make it in this world. He is pursuing a career as a diagnostic medical sonographer. He likes playing sports, I tries to stay active. Running 3 miles twice a week is a hobby of his, one of the few things that stuck with him after getting out of the Marine Corps.

I Believe In Living Everyday to the Fullest

Everyday is a gift that must not be taken for granted. It is important to appreciate everything you have and the people that are a part of your life because anything at anytime can happen. For instance, I could go buy a lottery ticket tomorrow, win, and nobody would ever see me in school again. On the other hand, accidents happen and I could be laying on the side of the road clinging to life. You can’t rewind the clock, so just live life to the fullest.

Mike was one of my best friends from high school. Although we were both very young, he taught me a very valuable lesson which came at a very high price. Not a day goes by where I don’t remember my pal Mike. One day he came over to my house, dragged me out of bed, and told me it was time to join the Marines. We went to sign up for infantry and we left for boot camp three months later. I made it through boot camp and Mike was discharged from the military. I received orders to serve my term on the east coast. I went to war in 2003, survived multiple battles and nearly got shot down in a C-130 plane by surface to air missiles. After all of this, I already had a new outlook on life. When I returned to my apartment, my ex-wife had bad news. At the age of twenty one, Mike was killed in a car accident the day I returned from the war. Live everyday to the fullest because you don’t know when your time is up.

We never know what is in store for us each and everyday. There are hundreds of thousand of different kinds of life changing events that can happen. Life is too short and it seems that every year it goes by faster and faster. It’s like what they say on the radio news channel, “every five minutes the news has changed.” The events of 9-11 are a prime example of drastic changes that shape our lives. Our country will never be the same as it was before this terrible tragedy that took so many innocent lives.

You can’t go back in time like in the movies, sometimes we wish we could; but in the end memories is what we are left with. When I get into arguments or confrontations, I think of how to end it calmly because I don’t want to have any problems that I don’t need. Life is too short to have the drama put you into a bad mood. Living and enjoying life while we are here is what is important.