Circumstances & Situations

Got a 43 year-old video of Led Zeppelin rolling through Kashmir playing on the computer as I put down the words you read here.

Life is about circumstances and situations and how we adapt to whatever comes across our path or so I told my friends Johnny and Jack.

We shared a beer and discussed what had been expected, promised and what had changed and had some good laughs at shared victories, absurdities and pain.

When they asked me what I thought I winked, said “I know things” and promised that what was thought to be unlikely and impossible was now possible, maybe even probable.

They said it sounded like I was using Vin Scully’s description of the Kirk Gibson home run in the ’88 World Series I laughed and nodded my head.

“You know there is a dispute about whether Picasso said, “good artists borrow, great artists steal.”

It might not be true, but I like it and I see no need to rebuild the wheel if it already exists, better to “work smarter, not harder.”

“There is a time for clever and a time for being easily understood. Some people cloak their true desire in layers to protect themselves because they fear vulnerability and rejection. That is a good way to never get answers.”

Seven More Semesters

Thanksgiving break is ending and my tomorrow my daughter will head back to campus to finish out the last two or so weeks of the semester and her finals.

I looked at her and said to remember, she only has seven more semesters of her undergraduate life to go. It was tongue-in-cheek but I know how fast that time will go.

A friend who is a little bit older told me to enjoy this moment, “you’re a young man in your early fifties and in a moment you’ll be in your late fifties with a daughter who has finished college. It goes that fast.”

He heard me roll my eyes at him and told me he was serious.

“I know you are, but I can only plan so far ahead. It is not that I won’t look towards that time and prepare, but rather that I don’t want to lose sight of now.

Call it experience and the knowledge that if I would have had a couple of different experiences earlier I would have made some bigger moves and not held back because of fear of a future I couldn’t control.”

Circumstances and situations are what held me back then and for a long while I didn’t see a path forward. Yet here I am having seen some of the roadblocks and challenges removed and opportunity that seemed remote isn’t anymore.

Life is funny that way.

Most of the time I smile at that because experience has taught me to. It is easier and less stressful than getting angry.

****

There is a young trainer at the gym who has approached me multiple times with an offer to help me train. He compliments me on my consistency, tells me he appreciates my dedication and says he can help.

I have always thanked him for his offer and told him I don’t have the cash for it now.

Yesterday I asked him if he had trained anyone in their fifties and he said no.

“I see value in having someone help construct a personalized plan that is focused on helping me build and maintain a functional body with functional strength. That means I want to reset my body and make sure that when I die at 130 I am still physically capable of taking care of myself.”

He nodded his head and said he understood and rattled off a couple of things that made me think he mostly got it but I didn’t sign up.

I don’t have endless amounts of spare cash and I don’t want to commit it to things that leave me uncertain about a return.

He said I ought to pay for four sessions but that is not enough for me to feel good about it. I have been going to the gym since long before he was born and capable of getting solid results on my own.

If I commit to a trainer I want to go for longer than four sessions. I want to be able to spend real time on a more intensive program.

My time is as valuable as the cash investment– won’t give up what I have without that return.

My work days are mapped out two-four weeks in advance and that doesn’t cover the multiple meetings that are scheduled further out.

So my personal time is even more important to me and I don’t offer to do things or spend time with people who aren’t important to me.

If you are among the few I try to schedule time with it is because you are important to me. And If I am on my game I have made it clear to you that I want you to be part of my life.

Circumstances and situations have taken too many away from me and I am certain that life will do that again. Don’t know who, when or where, but it will happen.

I don’t live in fear of it but I am cognizant of it so I try to be mindful of it. Can’t do any more than that and I am ok with it, some fights can’t be won so you submit where you must.

Flotsam and Jetsam

Been thinking about shaving the beard off for a while but haven’t decided yet if I will. If I trim it myself and screw it up there is a good chance I’ll just finish it off.

Worst case scenario I can grow it back. It grows pretty fast, but there are moments where I wish I could grow it back in a day.

That would make life interesting, I would probably play around it with a bit.

Still amazed at how fast this year went, it feels like only yesterday that I was asking what 2022 would be like and now I am looking at ’23 the same way.

Don’t want to jinx anything, but in some ways I feel far more optimistic about the future than I have in quite some time.

Hope that lasts.