I’m 47 years old, not quite 50. There are times when I am startled by that fact, if I live, that I will turn 50. For some reason, I never thought it would happen!
What a landmark birthday that can be. I suppose being 50 is a lot easier than turning 50. Then again, most of the excitement or dread at turning a certain age was forgotten the next day. Life isn’t that different when you cross an arbitrary line drawn in the sand.
What have I noticed about this age? You pile on such experiences that you can read people’s faces and discern the truth pretty quick. Also, you can easily see the authenticity in another person even if they’re unaware of their source of who-they-are. You can’t help but recognize the same ol’ facial expressions or speech people use again and again. People are people and they repeat things a lot.
Fun is different now. When you’re a kid, you can have fun with wild abandon without any judgment. There’s nothing wrong with getting filthy or imagining your day away.
Then, you hit your teens and you and everyone else seems to be hell bent on being seen having fun. Never mind the joy itself, as long as you can prove that you did have it. How many stories did you tell or hear others tell about weekends? Each weekend seems to be more berserk than the last. This doesn’t really abate till your in your late 30’s I swear, from what I’ve said and what others my age then said as well. Now, I could care less what others think of my idea of “fun.”
My idea of fun is more in tune with what I want versus any conformity to the people I know. I can be on my roof toying with an FM antenna array even though I look like some ham radio geek. So what… I LIKE IT.
Now I can care a little less how fashionable my clothes are, how I’m supposed to behave or what I can talk about or even if I’m cool. This is the compensation I get for getting older. I can publicly sneeze and have a clot of snot unexpectedly come flying out. Oh well, those things happen. Had I been 25 in a nightclub and did that, I’d be banished to Siberia.
