The Second Half of Life

You know, nothing irritates me more than those blog posts of 90 year olds saying 'life has just begun for me!'

Because, the numbers don't lie. You have until 100, or less. So after 40, you are half done your life.  

 

I'm over half done my life.  But I don't feel regret about anything particularly.  My regret is simply the same as most people my generation and most people everywhere. I often feel I am frustrated by the circumstances I live in, by the systems, by the missing opportunities that should exist. 

I can imagine what these opportunities are, or would have been, earlier in my life. But they simply weren't available to me.  And, unlike every single self-help video or book in the world, it wasn't something I could obtain. 

The things you know you would do as a young person, as a different person...there are things you could have done, but only if the technology, time, money, environment, people and luck converged. And even if all those things came true, you might still be worse off than you are now.  It's like saying I would be an Olympic athlete, if only I didn't have cancer that took my legs.  No one is bringing back the legs.

There are many things I have tried to do in my life, but I suppose very few things have been successful. The good news is that the things I have been successful at, have led to a stable life for me that I enjoy. That is pretty good.

But I still have a deep hunger for meaning as an adult. And that is not because I don't have direction, aspirations, goals. It's actually the opposite. It's because I know that life and its end are inevitable, that sometimes it feels like every small creative endeavor, every attempt at self-betterment, every attempt to change, seems silly in the face of decay, of self-lessening, of having access to only meager means to increase, advance or surpass expectations.

Because every moment in bettering myself is a moment spent in agony, in purgatory, in wishing to have enough time to be good enough to enjoy what I create and not feel empty.

Because every time I make something for me, and for others, I am emptying myself.  And there is joy in being empty. But being empty requires time to become full again, to have something to express myself with. And time is in short supply as an adult, no matter which path you walk in life.

We have nothing but time. And yet time is never available, not the kind you want, not with everything you need.  But. But....every moment spent doing good is a good moment. In a moment of goodness, we are ourselves.

And that's why I feel cheated. Like most people my age. Like perhaps all people who make it to my age. We have finally seen a hint of ourselves, and soon we will disappear, like ghosts or mermaid tails in the wind.