LXX: It's Gametime!

Not the Superbowl. Just my Birthday

Age is just a number.

You’re as young as you feel.

You don’t stop laughing when you get old; you get old when you stop laughing.

Hard work never killed anyone.

You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.

A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.

What goes around, comes around.

None of these are based on reality but they are sometimes guides..or crutches-- to allow us to throw up our hands and think we are not in control of our lives. We are.

Free will is the notional capacity or ability to choose between different possible courses of action unimpeded. Free will is closely linked to the concepts of moral responsibility, praise, culpability, and other judgments that apply to freely chosen actions.

Cliches and free will are intertwined. One is a choice, the other is adherence to nonsensical things people say.

(Hey, BK: Where are you going with this?)

While nailing down the final details for a 70^th birthday celebration with those I graduated from HS in 1971, that number looms large in my head. 70. 70. It’s not just a number. I knew kids who were 70, at age 17.

But I also am unsure what 70 is. At 70, my Dad was playing tennis twice a week in Florida.

My mother-in-law at 90, went to Las Vegas for a Mah Jong tournament, just weeks after attending a Pitbull concert with her grandson.

My wife at 68, does two hours of Peloton every day.

Some of my peers and older, walk the golf course instead of driving the cart because they like the exercise and they CAN.

Or they are cyclists.

I’m a skier but have not gone in three years because my wife doesn’t invite me.

A friend who I refer to often in my columns is 82 but despite any issues that may pop up, he has an attitude I don’t see many in his peer group having. He is positive.

One of my favorite quotes is from the character Red in “The Shawshank Redemption: “Get busy living or get busy dying.”

So why am I whining like a baby about hitting a milestone? I’m not really. I am reflecting. Milestones are just moments of pause to look back on life, what we savor, what we did well, and what we did..not so well.

As Paul Anka wrote (yeah. I know. Frank sang it but Anka penned it): “Regrets, I’ve had a few, but then again, too few to mention.”  But I’ll mention them. As everyone knows, my life is an open book, though sometimes I think it’s more of a pamphlet.

I dabbled in drugs, nothing too dangerous (but at 70, who cares?) but it caused a major hiccup at 19 and put my life on hiatus for 10 months.  With help, I got it together and applied to a respected university, and started my so-called legacy.

I married young the first time. At a time when I didn’t know myself, didn’t know the responsibility, and ended up causing a lot of pain to others. I had a family and I left, and I am not proud of it. I didn’t disappear by any means as I saw my daughter regularly. I think-or at least hope- I did my best. 

I carved out a career, one I take pride in, and quite surprised I was successful. Jobs like mine did not come along every day and I know I performed those tasks with compassion, knowledge, and fairness and got to enjoy some of those rewards, with friendships.

I once actually compiled a list of people I KNEW didn’t like me. I came up with four. Want to know who they are? Nope, not telling. But if anyone reading these cares to say: “You forgot me. I hate you;” send me a private message. I’d like to know.

I had a second chance at love at 37, meeting the woman who has become my soul mate and partner for over 33 years (she thought it was 32). It’s been a lifetime of fun, joy, and sadness.

Being a father was a joy. I was sometimes referred to as the ‘fun dad.’ Maybe so, but I was determined to take the life I unraveled and try and put the threads back together. I think, for the most part, I succeeded.

THEN, 2001 happened. As John Lennon said:” Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans.” Or, more aptly, when Wyatt Earp said to Doc Holliday on his deathbed: “Doc, all I ever wanted was a normal life,” to which Doc replied: There’s no such thing as normal, Wyatt, there’s just life.” 

If you’ve gotten this far in my self-indulgent recap of my life, I guess I’m just reflecting on this upcoming milestone of 70. Erica would have been 41 this November. I cannot change the past, but I can embrace the future.

70 is not just a number. Looked at the right way, it’s an opportunity, we often miss, to pause…look back, and see if we have become better people. I’m pretty sure I have.

 So, what does all this reflection really mean? How do I approach this birthday with hope and optimism?

Maybe the wisest man of all was Doc Brown who said to Marty McFly: “It means your future hasn’t been written yet. No ones has! Your future is whatever you make it. So make it a good one!”

Sounds like a plan.