Being completely screwed is rather liberating. It provides you with a perspective on life that you didn’t have before you were screwed. For example, when you weren’t screwed, you didn’t know you had all these opportunities before you. It’s rather nice actually.
When you’re 18 and just out of high school, you have no idea of what the world has to offer. All you know is that your parents want you out of the house, and you have to prepare for four more years of education, or get a job, or both. Add onto that the raging hormones and the lack of insight, and the world can seem pretty daunting. However, when you’re completely screwed at 45, you don’t have those problems. You’ve seen the world. You know how it all works. What’s usually blocking you is not the lack of opportunity, but a lack of motivation. By this point in life, most people want to rest on their laurels, and glide through until retirement. You also have to often deal with individuals who think that’s all you want to do as well. For some reason, people in their 20s think people in their 40s have one foot in the grave. Oh how little they know.
At 45 I’m smarter, more patient, open minded, and far more insightful than any 18 year old. I’m also a better friend, a better worker, and a much better lover, having the capacity to focus more on the needs of others than I do on my own. At 45, your focus changes, where you find it far more pleasing personally to see others around you satisfied than being satisfied yourself. I assure you…you don’t get that from a teenager.
So with my current job coming to an end, I look out before me at the many opportunities life has to offer. It’s amazing that with all these choices, it’s difficult to focus on just one. I have no idea what the world has in store, but I do know that I have the knowledge, and the perseverance to deal with whatever might be. In a lot of ways, I’ve gotten that wish where, “if I only knew then, what I know now.” Well…I do know it now, and I have the same opportunities I had then. And I plan on taking full advantage of those opportunities as they come up.
I feel young again! I feel the same as I did when I first set out to conquer the world at 18. I’m strong, I’m virile, I’m randy, and I’m ready. There’s no stopping me now!
Just tell me where the bus stop is, and I’m out the door!
Rex