It dawned on me tonight what my only problem – and it’s a pretty huge one – is that I never grew up. (I guess.) I look around the circle of friends I have amassed over the course of my life, many of whom are on my socials and think, how in God’s name is it that I know or have known this many people?
Many of whom within my age group have experienced the joys of a full life and it’s trappings. Relative upon relative. Many married. Friend upon friend. Many had children. Homes. Enjoying also great economic luck in their personal and professional lives. Grandchildren. The joy of an elderly parent or two still alive. All this stuff.
And having the best life – I think – I have been blessed or cursed to have thus far – how is it that I have had most if not all of those things elude me. Therefore? I must not have grown up? Ever?
I don’t know. I mean. Yeah. Whatever.
Time and again over the course of my life P.R. (Prior to having lived in Rockford, Illinois) I can recall bumping into this one family acquaintance and having him say, “Well, when’s the big day? Time is running out! Better not wait too long!”
Really? Seriously?
“You’re depriving yourself of these things for what? As some form of penance? Go out and get these things for yourself, man!”
Or the comment, “You sure don’t look sixty-one!” Taken at it’s most dispassionate, I suppose I can believe perhaps that the person saying that to me sincerely believed that to be true; can I not?
These two things are the only things keeping me from success, apparently. One. The phrases, “Better not wait too long”, and “You sure don’t look sixty-one” do not instill confidence in me anymore. I’m too old. I’m too tired.
—
Being single and never having grown up at this age is something new and different and strange in this present stage of life. So unto itself this is my final frontier; a space exploration of sorts. Friends and family watching it play out on these infernal Inter Webs. (Since March of 2005! Wow!)
So be it.
At my core I truly believe – on some level or another – even the married, fuller-lived people have days where they feel the same: that even though perhaps all their life’s trappings aside there’s still that child-like feeling of, “Have I really grown up? I feel like, nineteen, inside. Still. All this and how little I know and how much more I still need to grow.”
‘Best hope that that is the case.
I am no different. Perhaps. Either can be true.
—
Tempus Fugit.
Namaste.
That’s what’s up.
The other one is, “Oh boy, you have it so good. Single no attachments. Scurring about higgly piggly through the errands and chores of your days coupled with a 40 hour a week job, too? Single? Didn’t you live alone in Chicago (two different apartments) for twenty some odd years on your own there? Yeah I envy you. No children. No spouse. No home of your own. No responsibility.”
** cough **
I beg to differ. On the premise that . . . may the fleas of a hundred camels infest your arm-pits.
No.
I mean all those years I say I lead this balls-to-the-wall, devil-may-care, bon vivant, hell on wheels, Remington Studley sort of life simply just by being single – that I didn’t know what I had when I had it? You mean like that?
::::: BZZZT! :::::
I have a roommate now! My older sister. So have I really grown up? I think the tougher question goes a little something like this: are you happy whomever you are according to however old you feel? Perhaps these are truly the things keeping me young?
A. Wonderment about my world.
2. Being as happy as I can be.
Etc.
. . .and where can I find a good Italian Beef sandwich other than Portillo’s?
I think they have the market cornered on that one.
Way more important than this blog-writing, soul-searching, expedition into literary loitering.
Can AI write this?
I think not!
. . .but that beef sandwhich, though.
Definitely something AI cannot do.
Thank God.
🙂
MJC
Word Count: 709. Post #1355
Spare Change and Paradigms 