So today is my birthday.
I haven’t posted a blog in four months…quite frankly because, wow time
moves quickly at this age and I hadn’t really even noticed. I have reached that age that my mom likes to
joke that she had reached and never moved on from. It was funny a long time
ago, then it was cute…and today…well now I have reached that age. Damn…the yesterdays have moved fast…I still
remember the night out with the boys at Fieldhouse on my 21st ,
hanging with family in Chicago on my 25th
and the delicious steak on my 30th with friends from the Berg in
Columbia. I used to be good at
math. But somewhere between the confines
of finite numbers and bleary memories…I am still trying to figure out how I got
to 39 so fast.
Time has literally and figuratively been on my mind a lot
for the last year or so….theologically, biologically, emotionally. Movies, books, blogs and discussions. Renowned physicist Morgan Freeman taught me on “Through the
Wormhole”, that apparently as you age, time actually moves faster as you age,
proportionally of course… so that by time you are in your 80’s…you seem to be
ageing twice as fast as when you were 16. Oh, and if you want time to slow a
bit more…move to the top of a mountain, or get in a plane or spaceship that
goes real fast. I plan on taking a
spaceship to Mt. Everest…just to check that math.
If you know your Bible, you will remember Jesus telling us
to basically not worry about yesterday or tomorrow, that today would be enough
for today (Matt 6:34)…easy enough for the Son of God to say huh!? And if you
like sci-fi or physics, there are a plethora of explanations in books and
movies as to exactly what is going on in time or through time…recently the
movie “Interstellar” for example…let that warp your mind in time for a
bit. Equations and overly smart
scientists can talk all day (and they will)…yet it doesn’t stop the itching in
my head or yearning in my heart to understand…HOW can it truly have moved so
fast?
Or is it really moving at all? Perhaps it is closer to that “eternal”
now. Maybe the back-log of memories just
makes us feel like we are moving through time…holding onto the important things
too long sometimes…and others not long enough.
Maybe we are just floating in the space between memories? They say that
more often than not, dying people, or people who have been brought back to
life, these people say to hold onto the important things in life…the people and
loved ones around you. I think that was
what Jesus was probably getting at with his thoughts on “today”.
So today, join me…hold on, to today…to that which burns
through your inner being, that which carries your soul from the first light of
day at the dawning of your alarm clock, to the last wavering thought upon your
pillow at night. Carpe Diem…”seize the
day”…may be too much of a cliché (but you got to love Robin Williams quoting it
in Dead Poets Society)…but at my age, clichés are just moments that remind me
of things that meant something to so many people, there was just no better way
to say it…so who really cares if it is a cliché!? Seize it!
I think as I stare into the long avenue of the 40’s coming
at me…I will choose rather to seize it, bite into it, chew it, breathe it
in…live it, and keep going. I plan on
learning French, writing more poetry, reading more books, seeing more of the
world with my lovely wife, making new friends and even having deeper and more
intense conversations with God. Who
knows, maybe God will finally tell me what this time thing is all about? But until then, I am and will be…the time I
make of the day I live...again, for the 14,235th time…and on…and on.
But you don't have to take my word for it...you can always refer to the ageless, sage-like advice of Ferris...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91lJhEzMaH4
