Pad, pad, pad, pad
It’s 4:45 on a Sunday. I’m running along a dark street without a trace of traffic and I pretty much have the world to myself. It’s bitterly cold and every bit of exposed skin is pleading to go back inside but I keep going anyways.
Nothing for my mind to do but engage in contemplation.
I turned 43 recently. A fairly meaningless number really. It’s not a significant age in our culture. Just a place holder between 40 and 45 really. I stopped caring about my age years ago. But I do sometimes marvel at where time has gone.
I went to my brother’s place for Thanksgiving. All the family was gathered and my nephew, just graduated from college, was there with his girlfriend. They announced that they were expecting their first child. How is that possible? He was just playing with pogs and insisting I watch pokemon with him just the other day.
Oh right…. that was 15 years ago….
I look at my old man carefully shuffling along with his cane. He’s wearing a coat indoors because despite the heater he still feels cold. I still see him as the guy that would be taking long work assignments in Chile or Guatemala or a half-dozen other places. Working from a field camp in the jungle or in the desert or in the mountains. The guy who could fix anything round the house or on the car, the one who made all the important decisions for the family.
But that was ages ago.
I’ve done a couple of miles and I’m freely sweating and breathing hard. Time for a short walking break. My knee and my hip ache a bit. A temporary thing, it will pass.
I reflect that not so long ago I would have been arriving home at this hour from a Saturday night out on the Richmond strip. Sleep till 11 or so and then do little to nothing for the rest of Sunday but play video games and watch TV. Just waiting for Monday to roll around to start the cycle all over again.
But that too was ages ago.
Normally I would bemoan all the time lost in the past but I know that all of that time has been spent and can’t be retrieved. Instead I think of the coming year and think of each month and what I want to achieve in that time.
The last couple of years have been about atoning for past sins and beginning to correct the damage that neglect has caused. 43 will be about pushing forward with my life and plotting a new course for my life.
43 will not be just another number.
Recent Comments