I remember when I was younger one of the chief attractions of being “older” was the thought that then I would be “in charge” of my life. No more of mom and dad’s rules, I could stay up as late as I wanted, eat whatever I wanted, and watch whatever TV I wanted – (and at 15, when I chiefly remember this feeling and cable was just in its infancy, this meant the promise of unlimited MTV and late-night Cinemax movies… ah, the freedom!).
As I scurried from task to task over this last month, and struggled to maintain my workout regime, and my diet, as well as my professional equilibrium, and ensure my cat got fed while I travelled, I realized – as I looked up from my laptop, two things: first, I was very fortunate in current economic conditions to be employed and (in any economic conditions) to be employed doing something I loved; and second, I was so fucking busy that I turned 42 and realized my childhood illusions about staying up late were pretty funny. Now, I was struggling to get to bed at a decent hour so I could (a) get more than 5 hours of sleep, so I could (b) be fresh enough to go full-tilt the next day, and (c) get enough rest to reap the benefits of my workouts, and (d) not break down physically.
Turning 42 was pretty anti-climactic. All it did was allow me to say “I’m forty-two without my need for precision to force me to correct myself and say “in 3 months” or something like that. Now the qualifier is gone. I don’t quite feel Fifty breathing down my neck yet, but I can see its shadow looming a little down the road, like a dark cloud in the distance while you’re still driving in the sunlight across a flat plain. There’s a slight rise and beyond that things look a bit…murky.
It does feel like I’ve come into my own, both professionally and personally, and I’m reminded of being in high school french class, reading an abridged version of Victor Hugo’s “Les Miserables.” There’s a chapter of the book describing a character (we later know to be Jean Valjean) and it talks of him being “un homme tres fort et dur” and then there is a line that essentially was french for “being in the prime of his years,” or something like that. We had this petite blond french teacher who was probably in her early thirties (it’s funny how I remember thinking of her as “older”) and when she gave us the translation, all of the young boys (me included) laughed at the thought of a man in his Forties being “in his prime.” But it wasn’t some mocking, punky laugh – we genuinely thought it was funny – at least I did. I/We couldn’t imagine that anything forty years old could be in its “prime.”
My mom got a measure of vengeance against my 17 year-old self by leaving me a message on my birthday that said: “Happy Birthday… you old fart.” When I called her back to complain about such shabby treatment from the woman who bore me, she gave me this one: “When I turned fifty, I remember you called me to remind me that I was now ‘a half-century’ old.” Touche. Wow. I guess I was a little bastard at 17 (my age when she turned 50 in 1987).
Hopefully, the start of more consistent writing again.