We often organise our lives around the assumption that there will be another opportunity.
Another visit. Another conversation. Another day when there is more time and the words come more easily.
My mother's illness has made that assumption feel fragile.
Our relationship has not always been easy. There are difficult things within it, alongside love. I do not want to turn that history into a perfect picture. But I love my mother, and I feel the sadness of knowing that some moments may not wait for us.
I fear that when the final goodbye comes, the goodbye I long for - a conversation in which we truly meet each other - may no longer be possible.
That changes the meaning of now.
It does not mean every visit has to resolve the past. Sometimes being there is enough. Sometimes we have to accept the limits of a moment and still recognise its value. Love does not always arrive as a clear answer or a finished conversation.
For me, carpe diem has become quieter and more grown-up. It means making room for what matters while it is still available: the call, the visit, the shared silence, the words we can say today.
This is not an instruction to live without responsibilities or plans. It is a reminder to ask whether those plans leave space for the people and experiences we do not want to keep postponing.
In work, as in life, priorities become real through the time we give them. Some decisions can be revisited. Some opportunities cannot.
We cannot know which moment will be the last of its kind. We can choose to be more present in the moments we have.