Like It Is (For Now)

Turning 68 I find to be extraordinarily (super) underwhelming.  Not like, oh, 10 or 13 or 16 or 18 or 21, maybe 30. I did flinch at 35, thinking a sort of midpoint being reached, but then I realized odds were my horizon may extend out a bit further. But you never know. 

Somehow I have come to believe 70 will bring a certain gravitas into the mix, but just 2 years to set aside my foolishness seems decidedly (super) unlikely. Truth: Perhaps I just like the sound of the word--gravitas.

Oh, becoming eligible for Medicare, that's a milestone.

I'm healthier now than I was throughout most of my 50s. Some of that is self-discipline, some is being away from the stress of my day job. Not stronger. Not faster. Not smarter. Healthier.

Kinder, gentler, too, I hope.

My attention span has withered significantly. Where once I would read nearly nonstop for 3 or 4 hours, now a single hour is a bit of a stretch. Fiction has all but disappeared from my reading habit. Why? Most of the time the novels are too long by a hundred or more pages. And I find I really don't care all that much about the characters. Live, die. Get a life, don't. So nearly all nonfiction these days for me.

Sitting through a movie without commercials is nearly impossible. I like the breaks. Get up, wander around, maybe go outside, forget the movie is back on. And don't care.

I like the sound of children playing better than--okay, it's a very long list.

Folks yapping about a life without regrets, well bully for them. I do have regrets, especially for hurting people. To me regrets are like scars. Nothing wrong with reminders of something gone wrong. Sure, sure, going forward, I hope not to generate new regrets. I'm trying.

I'm not a fan of the word wisdom. Let's dial back expectations of one another and allow that experience accumulates and may matter in some fashion along and along.

Understatement is undervalued these days. 

Irony, too, I suspect.

Way back in the day--half a century ago--on a birthday my friends and I would suggest that thoughts and reflections should be offered up with said special day. And I say now what would be the standard response back then: I got nothing.

Oh, more importantly, one more thing, the day after my birthday--August 12th--is World Elephant Day.