- Monday's child is fair of face
- Tuesday's child is full of grace,
- Wednesday's child is full of woe,
- Thursday's child has far to go...
I am older today than I was yesterday and I hope, a mite wiser. The 23rd of November, 2011 is upon me and it’s time for some sober self-reflection. This is a good time to meditate on how my life has shaped up so far, after all, there is much to contemplate on. But before I conduct an autopsy on my life, let me show some gratitude, for there is so much to be thankful for. I am thankful for the fact that I am still alive and in reasonably good health; that I am employed; that I have a roof over my head; that I am a part of a large, loving and rambunctious extended family; that I am unlikely to go hungry or fall into destitution anytime soon; that I have at least a few dependable all weather friends; that God loves me...and so on.
A little soul searching seems to suggest that getting a year older may have brought in an intangible benefit, the very one I was out looking for; that is to say, I really feel- I am a little wiser for it! Gaining an inch on that wondrous thing called wisdom each birthday would be the greatest benefit to growing old, wouldn't it now? But sadly, we never do wish for wisdom in annual increments like we do for our paychecks.
Some people have an irrational fear of growing old, I am not one of them, and it's not because I am still young-still very much in the prime of life, so to speak. I feel the qualities of youth are overrated by almost everybody ; Oui that includes Moi. My grouse is against our mortal handicaps, those truly extraneous but very human impediments that bait us any given day- the desires and goals we burden ourselves with as we plod along in life, instead of just living our lives in contentment. My beef is with the whole 'business of being a human being.' This I fear is a universal human tragedy and no one is immune.
Only human beings have a hard time simply being human, a dog is never quite in a dilemma over what kind of a dog it is and foxes know from birth, how to be foxy all over their hunting grounds. We have to become a particular type of person, and build up a particular type of identity to even have a sense of fulfillment as a human being- That makes sense right? It's not intrinsic at all, dogs and foxes have it better than us in some ways, they are on auto-pilot while we have to steer and row all over the treacherous existential seas. For us, it's all about growth and maturing, and learning; and release; and catharsis; and forgiveness; and self-realization; and self-actualization, ad nauseum, ad mortem, ad infinitum. We have to grow and grow, and break down and rise up and grow some more- we do grow, yes, but much too slowly. At this rate, we will be dead before we become wise and much before we have come to accept ourselves as legitimate human beings. I don't want to be a permanent tourist in that undiscover'd country just yet, at least not before I have found out what I am doing here on planet earth. I will of course eventually go there, to that mysterious country, but many birthdays later, I hope.
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of? - Hamlet
Goals are of course, necessary in our journey through life, they give us meaning and help us to attain a measure of happiness, two common ideals we all subscribe to. Indeed, our goals in life and our endless desire for material attainments can mutate and change, but the search for meaning and happiness is universal and immutable. I have to admit but I am not in the place in life where I thought I would be at this age. I haven't met my core goals in life as yet, some of the more important ones at any rate. Somewhere out there in the ageless ether of the multiverse, in the misted twilight of another earth at another time, there is a sixteen year old me, looking down at what I have become, peering down at me right at this moment and he isn't impressed! Oh boy!
"You've gone sloppy, he says
"What" I say
"Pudgy" he says and "Old"
He sneers at me with the untrammeled confidence of youth. "OOOLD" he says, he's hateful and judgmental and from his vantage point- things might seem exactly like that, deserving of derision. I have not yet reached that place I set out for and aimed at when I started out from the hormone addled Eden of my troubled teenage years. Not so long ago, I might add.
"You haven't become what you promised me you would become" he says
"Give me a chance, dammit" I say " there's time, people grow and mature and eventually succeed at what they set out to do" He chuckles deviously and the sound of it wears down my confidence,
"and I will" I add quickly. He's unhappy but I must fend him off. I am not about to be judged and made to feel all apologetic by a sixteen year old. I feel like giving him a punch, but think better of it. The punk might outpunch me.
" Give me some more time" I say.
"Time" He says, mysteriously. Then he laughs a goofy little laugh. Heeheehawheehaw
"Well, Fuck you" I say
"If you Fuck me, you fuck yourself" The cheeky punk replies.
