So, you go to the doctor for a routine check-up.

Nothing out of the ordinary. You're in peak physical condition, and you always wear a condom.

Three-mile runs and eight hours of sleep are the norm. The doctor checks your pulse, reads your chart and announces your time of death -- one week from today.

It's the age-old icebreaker. In one form or another, you have one week to live and usually about 10 minutes to think about it. Ten minutes to decide the rest of one's life seems a bit rushed. A bit impractical.

That is the whole point of it though, isn't it? Make a rushed judgment to see where your allies really reside. An ink blot test of the grandest sort.

Our first instinct is rarely the best one. Still, take a moment right now and answer the question. Do it. Put down your coffee, tune out the calculus and take a minute out of your day to decide your fate.

Got it? Good. Were you fanciful? Adventurous? Outrageous? Romantic? Was it Paris or Rome? Skydiving or bungee jumping?

Sex or... sex?

That answer is your first instinct. Or maybe it isn't. Maybe you out-thought yourself and tried to answer it in a way that was self-righteous and meaningful. Regardless, there are things to be learned from the answer and choices to be made.

Write down your answer and come back to it a few days later to see how much you agree or disagree.

After taking the time to answer the question for myself, I asked a few fellow students.

"Go to as many baseball stadiums as I can," said Dan Spade (freshman-biology).

"I would spend the week with my family and friends," said Juliann Haynes (freshman-aerospace engineering).

"I'd go to Vegas and bet it all," said Jason Babcock (senior-pre-medicine).

Some answers were extremely ambitious.

"Everything and anything I have ever wanted to do but was too scared to try," said Chris Ingham (sophomore-information and sciences technology).

Others were meek in comparison.

"I'd go to Daytona," said Dustan Karschner (freshman-meteorology).

And of course, there was the inevitable Quagmire reference.

"Two chicks at the same time. Giggity giggity," said Greg Asselta (freshman-industrial engineering).

It seems that all people have a different idea of what they would do with their last time on this earth, and I wouldn't hesitate to agree with any of them. A person's response is almost a direct reflection of his or her life now, and since every one of us is different, the wide range of response doesn't surprise me one bit.

However, I'd like to offer up my perspective on the matter, one that is hopefully a little more all-encompassing than the individual ideas of the students here on campus.

After the week is over, after you have taken your last breath and have "shuffled off the mortal coil," you will no longer be "you."

It doesn't matter what your spiritual identity is; unless you plan on being immortal, there will come a time when you will lose the "you" as it is currently defined. You may be reincarnated as a professional baseball player. You could spend the rest of eternity in Heaven. You might just die and stay dead.

Whatever happens, you will never put another sock on the left foot you have now. Your voice will never sound the same. Even if you move on to a perfect recreation of your life now, it is still just a recreation of an original.

It's like telling someone you saw the Eiffel Tower, when really all you saw was a $5 miniature replica.

That answer you came up with, does it seem like a worthy finale to your last acts as "you?" Is it a fitting end to a thinking, feeling human such as yourself?

I'm willing to wager that trip to Europe or that ménage-a-trios isn't exactly the most human act you could come up with. Who's to say that you won't be able to walk the streets of London for thousands of years after your death?

Who's to say that there won't be a hundred naked men or women waiting to feed you grapes off the vine? There really is no way to know what waits for us on the other side.

But, what I can guarantee is that you will never get another shot at this one, singular "you."

And in doing so, I can only recommend one thing. Spend that week being you. Get in fights with your friends. Find comfort in passion, amusement and weakness. You have one week -- one -- with the people that define your existence.

How often do you laugh out loud when you are alone? Really, truly, laugh out loud with no one else around? Now think about how often you laugh when you are with friends, family and even perfect strangers.

Do you really want to set that aside for scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef?

You will never get to love that person in the same way again, you will never get to high-five after the buzzer as the same "you" you are right now, and you will never again get to speak your mind and have it heard as your voice.

You only have one week left.

Make the most out of it.