This morning over breakfast my husband and I were talking about commercials that stayed in your mind for years, long after they were off the air.

Sometimes, a catch phrase in certain commercials becomes part of our vocabulary.

David recalled “Where’s the beef?” uttered by the infamous Clara in the Wendy’s commercial.

I mentioned, “Mikey likes it” from the Life cereal commercial. He never heard that one.

“When did it air?” he asked. I guessed it was about 40 years ago.

“Forty years ago is a long time,” he said.

It depends on what you’re talking about. Trying to remember something from 40 years ago does, indeed, sound like a long time.

But when it comes to your life span, 40 years is but a blink in time.

I went to a motivational talk where something the speaker said jumped out at me, landing smack in my mind and staying there.

What she said was, “We’re here for just a moment.”

Of course that’s just another way of saying life is short. Somehow, because we hear it so often, that’s too much of a worn-out expression. It doesn’t hit with force.

But when the speaker reminded us we are here for just a moment, it stayed with me and has influenced my thoughts and actions.

I keep asking myself, if this is the last moment I will have, will I want to spend it like this? Often, that thought makes me do an about-face.

Here’s an example that happened a while back when my feelings were hurt by one of David’s offhand comments.

Just as I was ready to return that comment with a zinger of my own, I asked myself how I would like to spend the moment if it were one of my last ones.

Instead of retorting, I laughed and gave David a hug. He gave me a bigger hug back.

See that? Actually acknowledging life doesn’t go on forever can help us make better use of the time we do have.

I confess that ever since I heard that motivational talk I’m more conscious about how I spend the moment at hand. As much as possible, I try to make it count in some way.

I know life isn’t filled with all highs. We all have plenty of problems as well as an occasional heartbreak.

When that happens to me, I try to remember the phrase, “This too shall pass.”

Because it does.

A moment in time is so fleeting. It’s like life itself.

I find that being aware of the fragility of life makes me more determined to make the moment at hand a good one.

When I went for a walk the other day, I met an old man sitting on his porch. I didn’t know him but it was clear he wanted to talk. When he smiled, I noticed he had fewer teeth than a jack-o’-lantern.

Instead of hurrying by, I chatted with him, realizing I could make the moment a good one for both of us. I was surprised at how bright and interesting he was.

He told me he and his wife are having a neighborhood party next week. My husband and I are invited, he said. We won’t know anyone, but I bet it will be interesting.

All that and it just started from a simple moment of exchanging pleasantries.

It’s surprising what comes our way when we are open to it.

That happened on another walk when I met my neighbor Steve. He said he was having a tough time getting by because his sister just died.

“At 62, she was way younger than me and had nothing wrong with her,” Steve said.

Then he mentioned his serious heart condition that has no easy fix.

“My sister’s death hit me smack in the face with just how short life is. I don’t think mine will be that much longer, either,” he worried.

I told Steve when you realize unpleasant realities like that, there is only one thing you can do in response. He wanted to hear what response I meant.

“Hang on to every moment. Squeeze every bit of joy you can summon throughout your days. And make every moment you are given count for something,” I told him.

Whenever I lose someone I love, I know my responsibility is to remember all the good moments we shared, then to honor those who left this earth by living my life in a meaningful way.

A long time ago a very close friend of mine suffered though the unexpected death of her 46-year-old husband.

I went home to my own husband that night with steaks for his dinner. Because we were pouring money into fixing the house, we didn’t have much left for splurges. We ate way more hamburger than steak.

My husband thought it was a crazy time to splurge when we had just lost someone we loved.

My thought was we shouldn’t wait for special moments that might not be ours to have. Rather, we should take the moment at hand and make it special. Our friend’s death reinforced that.

We have no control over how much time we are given.

All we can control is how we spend that time.

When we realize we are only here for a moment, how we spend that moment becomes paramount.

Contact Pattie Mihalik at newsgirl@comcast.net.