35 Already?

This is a thought-line I made up a few months ago..just more warblings.

Introspection:

I’m 35 now. I personally think that this is middle age. If I’ve basically lived half my life then why am I not even half the person I want to be? What have I been doing all this time? I consider myself lucky enough to at least think of the words like authenticate, visualize and sanctify as this life’s journey draws me nearer to the core of whom I’m trying to discover. My love has always been archeology but I had no idea I’d always be looking into my own past and piecing together my own history.

At the 2008 New Year I woke up in the middle of the night to write what turned out to be my most promising set of resolutions yet. With no fewer than 30 action words, this a list of potential. And one that highlighted my true fears – ignorance and the passing of time. I’m in ruthless pursuit, kinetically charged to make potential a reality. Sorry, science geek, I KNOW.

Potential is what I embrace and fear the most. When a person dies, of course, I mourn the loss of their physical presence but I mourn the loss of their potential. Because are we really as bound as we feel at the time? I fear being old and realizing that I was free but ignorant of the opportunity. So goes my theory of wanting my mind to go before my body.

By the purest definition, potential dreams and goals are stored dreams and goals. Nothing becomes of them without the kinetic push of motivation and nothing stops them faster than friction. This friction manifests itself in the lines on our face or gray hair. The crow’s feet beginning in the creases of my eyes tell stories of squinting - trying to look too far into the future. I’ll never forget living in Missouri, listening to tornado sirens and wondering to myself if when I die I can say I lived through a tornado. I was 6 and already both oblivious and inwardly attuned to the vastness of human time. I catch myself now asking myself if I’ll ever get to donate a kidney, will I ever hang prayer flags in Tibet, will I ever go deaf? There is an explanation about the deafness...it’s not that random. Of all the senses that I may one day lose I would want to lose my hearing first. I may not be able to hear my loved ones voices but I would be able to see their beautiful faces and the colors God made. And, there is a back up, you can always talk with your hands.

Just as the universe has endless potential, so do we. Are we not perfect, complete beings worthy of our best efforts until we pass? Are we ever too old to live how we’ve imagined? But – more importantly – are we allowed to live as we imagined. Quoting Forrest Gump’s momma “ You have to figure that out for yourself.”