A few months ago I was e-mailing a colleague back and forth and one of his e-mails said: "Next Friday is my birthday and I am turning an age that seems almost impossible to believe. I CANNOT BELIEVE I am now this old." I picked up the phone and called him to say "Are you going to be 60? I am sorry" You know what his response was? It was "THANK YOU, you are the ONLY person who has hit the right sentiment." He was fed up with hearing "Oh how wonderful, what great life you have had." We both agreed YES it has been a wonderful life with lots of accomplishments and accolades and will probably continue to be but aging still sucks.
My father who is not a very sentimental dude or for that matter a very expressive guy has recently lost two of his brothers and when I called to see how he was doing, you know what his response was? It was: "You know, I am fine and proud of what I have done. I am happy with my life, BUUUUT I LIIIIKE life, I do not want to get off the carousel. I want another ticket. I want to go around again"
Yesterday I met with a few friends who I do not see regularly. We span an age range of 43 to 55. We are going to seem ungrateful with this but we all agreed that as my colleague and Dad said, aging sucks and we don't like it. And the general odd, weird concensus is that it happened too fast AND we did not see it coming. I know it sound ridiculous, HOWWW???? could we not have seen it coming ?! - aging is one of those things that kinda hits you in the face literally EVERY DAY! It is happening as I write this.
Why are we all so surprised? Why is this hitting us "unexpectedly" in the face"? Why are we acting like deer caught in headlights? Huh?? What? How? Why are we all waking up on our birthdays thinking - how the fuck did this happen? WTF?!?!?
Here it is, we are not prepared because it DID happen FAST, the Earth has been around for gizijillions of years and we are around for a measly 100 of those (if you are lucky). In the whole evolutionary scheme of things THAT is an INFINITESIMAL amount of time!!! Turns out that as of today we know that atoms do not represent the smallest unit of matter. Particles called quarks and leptons seem to be the fundamental building blocks of matter but it seems that there might be something even smaller. I hate to break this to you but it seems that in terms of infinitesimal things .... we are the quarks of evolution (mind you fruit flies are even worse, I wonder if this happens to them - in their little brains they are like ... hold oooonnnnn just half a second ago ago I was flying around and now I CAN'T - aging sucks!).
So, if you want to feel better be assured ...... it DID happen overnight. I DID find myself pulling out my gray hair from one day to another. My running injuries DID go from being healed in one day to being healed in 3 months in a blink. Going from "full" bodied to "fluff" bodied DID actually JUST creep up on me. Benjamin DID grow a few feet and his voice DID change from Monday to Tuesday. Sebastian DID become a 6 foot full bearded man on his almost way to University overnight.
In summary, EVERYTHING DID JUST HAPPEN IN A FLASH!!! There, now I feel better.
Happy Birthday Youngster!
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