This is 40?????

Two days in the books since I turned 40. Sitting here trying to come up with some really clever things to say, but I’m plum out. I’m sort of bemused by and betwixt many trains of thought. As I approach the next chapter of my life, I wonder why I feel so disconnected from so many things. I had been looking for more. As if by the stroke of midnight on the 16th, that I would transcend my consciousness in some way and have some answers to a great many things. Nothing happened. I just woke up, had a piss, and then tumbled back to bed.

In the morning, I woke up to the joy of a lovely woman with my second child kicking in her belly, and the sounds of a chattering toddler on the monitor. What is really needed beyond that? When I really think about it, not much. As much as there is curdling about in my craw, the acceptance of the real things in my life, may contain the pathway to the answers that I seek. I need not look any further than that.

Yes, I turned 40 on Saturday, and it comes with certain ideas and characteristics. My hair turned prematurely grey during my twenties. So that didn’t blindside me. My knees suck from years of inebriated Olympics. So, without much drama I shuffled into the fourth decade of my life with the aforementioned traits. I am what I am. The great irony is the baby cheeked face I still possess and the straw laden beard of white, red-gold, and black whiskers. I sense a madman behind that countenance, but all behaviors point to procrastination on that point, sadly. A madman would be more interesting. No?

What about the questions, the trains of thought, the clever things? Well, they are just that, whether I possess them or not. Sincerity and truth are friends I now seek in my expression. I seek acceptance of who I am, and want to love that guy for who he has become. I sense that at this point of my life, I can still strive to be a certain something, but in the living that has occurred there needs to be an acknowledgement that there are equal amounts of road behind and ahead for me. Not as much ahead as I had once believed there to be.

When you’re more youthful, you tend to believe that there is an infinite amount of possibility ahead. As you age, you find that your perspective ages as well, and it becomes humbled by the brevity of the time that remains. Wisdom sneers at the offense of youth, which clearly is the willful ignorance that comes of believing that you will live forever. None of us will. None of us do. But what to do with the time we have when we possess it? I feel that I, you, and all of us owe it to ourselves to seek the joy of living in spite of the harsh truths that surround our mortality.

This is 40?

Yes, and that is just fine. The road is shorter now, and there are fewer beads running down the egg timer. But I feel that I am a little wiser and a little smarter, and I truly enjoy the life that exists here. Looking forward to making the most of it all.