URNotAlone

Birthdays

April 1st, 2007 10:38 pm MDT

            Sunday came and went.  I now pass into the 26th year.  I think back to when I was younger and remember the anticipation and joy of having a birthday party and receiving gifts.  I remember when asked my age answering with “…. and a half”.  After about age 18, I stopped keeping track of my age.  Instead of recalling a number it was simply a case of mental math: current year minus 1981, taking into account current month, and oh yeah, I’m  ---- years old.  My 21st birthday passed without the common practices of my peers (then again I don’t drink), just another day preparing for an exam the next day.  Today I tend to try getting through the day without anyone knowing.  While many tend to look upon birthdays as a celebration of life, I find myself using them to reflect on my failures.  Such was the case today.  At age 26, I have yet to live up to my personal goals and fear that I am running out of time.  The past ten years have been filled with few highs and many lows and missed opportunity.  Little can be done to change this. It started with a burn out in 1998-1999 followed by coasting, which lead to a complete crash and burn at the end of 2003.  Since then I have made slow progress but have lost most faith in my own judgment.  I am particularly critical of how I have gone about this progress and see errors in judgment and action and lack of being proactive and selling myself short.  Again little can be done to change this.  The only positive thing to come out of this is motivation to change and reach new goals.  Also I am becoming aware that one of the most limiting obstacles resulting from 2003 can and will come to an end in one-years time, assuming I reach my financial goals between now and then.  So, perhaps my 27th will be a cause for some celebration.  The problem still remains that I am getting older and fear the need of career change and training that may take me beyond age 30 to only end up where I wanted to be now.  The Big 30 in my mind represents the point where life should begin to come to stability.              As long as I have my health, I will continue to fight back.  This brings me to my final point.  My greatest fear is being unable to fight.  My life centers on fighting in the present to create the future.  I know well the error of procrastination and excess leisure after talking to my elders and seeing their problem of being unable to fight back. Enough for now....