Happy Birthday To Me

09, originally uploaded by palm0014.

The beauty of turning thirty is to look at what you have accomplished until this point in life. I’ll be honest with you, I think it started to hit me hard a few months ago and I got trapped in the regular “OH LORD, WHAT AM I DOING WITH MY LIFE?!” thoughts…

But then I took a different perspective on the whole 1/3 of my life gone and looked back at everything I have accomplished and I’m proud of it. I’ve come a long way, whether it be in the education of my mind, musical ability, entertaining the masses, visiting the world…it’s only the first 30 years of my life and when you think of it, we’re all kids for the first half of it and so it’s only been for the past 15 years that we’ve all really gone out and done something on our own. From those last fifteen years, we’re stumbling along wondering how to get through it and wondering if you should take the path well traveled (arguably society’s foray into having a steady income and living a predictable life with a few odd adventures here and there) or the one less traveled where we seek out adventure first and predictability second.

Uncle Gerry gave me a letter which has stuck to me over all these years. He gave it to me at what can only be called one of the more formative periods of one’s life; the week before leaving your home to go to school in a big city. This letter outlined how no path is wrong, but it’s about finding out what’s the right one for you to travel on. It was inspiring to read this as I started out on a path that is still arguably society’s path and wondered if I would enjoy it or not.

I look forward to the next 2/3 of my life and all the wonders that lie within them. This is a crucial time for me to ramp up my explorations into literature, education, music, travel and friendships. It is the calm before the storm which will eventually come to me in the form of family of my own one day and the subsequent adventure that ensues from that path.

I am proud of everything I have accomplished up until this point and I embrace the turning of thirty years. Bring on all the laughter and the jests of getting old! I can’t wait. I’m in better shape than I have ever been, both physically and mentally and I have a ‘joie du vivre’. There isn’t anything stopping this train of rock n’ roll, existentialism and the ever longing questions of how the heck they get the caramel in the Caramilk bar.

* Can I point out that it’s great to see that I had an Amazing Spider-Man shirt back in 1982 when this photo was taken?

* I’m gone to Gaspe for the week. I’ll update the blog whenever possible.