I dropped the “f”-bomb in this one.

So many answers bringing on so many more questions. Nothing is any clearer…but….it is somehow more….*sharp inhale*…I don’t know the right word….peaceful maybe? I feel more balanced than I have in some time. I know I’ve shared this story before but I don’t know that I have ever done it openly (as in, not a friends only entry). But when I was 9, my best friend died. He was 7 at the time. I had been around the death of the elderly by that point, but never the death of a person so young. It was the first time I came to the realization that my own mortality wasn’t necessarily something in the distant future; it could be any time. After that, I didn’t expect to see age 12. When I made that I thought there was NO WAY I’d make 15. 15 came and went and I didn’t think it was possible to live until 18. Then it was 21, 23, 25, 27. It became such an ingrained part of my personality that it has influenced much of my life and who I am. I let some things go that I’m paying for now. I decided since I wouldn’t live all that long, I’d only bathe every so often (of course around 14 when I got interested in dating women that quickly changed), I quit brushing my teeth most of the time, I started smoking, drinking and TRYING to get into fights. Some of it I outgrew, some of it I didn’t. But the point is my focus was on the fact I would die soon and those things wouldn’t matter as much as having lived. Which is all well and good, but there was no thought of future things. There was no future. Why the fuck would I make plans for a day that would never come?

Now here I am. I’m 28 and it’s been the first year in my life where I have ever thought, "huh, I’m still here. Maybe I should think about things I want to do with my life and make goals instead of just letting things happen for me and rolling with it." It’s the first time I thought about the fact that, yeah, I may die before 29, but I may live until I’m 99. It’s the first time I’ve thought about what I want to be when I "grow up" and what I want to do before I do finally kick the bucket.

You want to know the funny thing? I’m a hell of a lot more frightened at the possibility that I may in fact live to see 30 than I was of dying tomorrow. I’m paying for not doing things I should have when I was younger. My teeth are slowly deteriorating; I don’t have the lung capacity I once did; I didn’t bother with college (though I do read a tremendous amount of everything and expanded my education through books and life rather than institutions; I wish I could have gone and may yet try, but if I don’t make it to that, I won’t feel I’ve missed out or lack intelligence.); all I did was work enough to get by and play rock and roll and do…well, whatever I wanted honestly. Move to another state miles from home with no money and no job prospects? Sure. Quit a job before even having an interview with the other job I applied for? Why not? Move back to my hometown with no money and no job? Worked out the last time. Anyway, point is I’m paying for some of those choices now. It does sort of make me wonder though if I’ll be one of those people that starts living healthy- quits smoking, eats right, exercises regularly- and then dies of a heart attack for no apparent reason.

I guess what I’m driving at, if anything, is this is the first time in my life I haven’t been 100% convinced I will be dead before my next birthday and it worries me that it might happen because I’m not expecting it. I mean, I know I could, but for the first time, I don’t feel in my innermost soul that I absolutely will. I guess I’m cautiously optimistic at this point and can start making some sort of grand plan. I feel a little cheated that I’m making decisions at 28 that most people had made by 18 and a good deal had made by 25 at the latest. But oh well, I guess I have all the time in the world for that now.

To any of those that don’t know me and are confused by all this, why the deuce did you read it? =) Just kidding. Thanks for reading it and I’ll come up with something more…friendly I guess…for next time.

Friends, I bid you the utmost inner peace and tranquility and in the words of an old Irish blessing, "May you live as long as you want and never want as long as you live".

Peace,
CCG