I read a book written by a bloke all about turning 30. It was very funny and I could relate to much of what was in there, But it wasn’t how I felt about turning 30 it was more like how I felt about turning 35.
It sounds strange I suppose that turning 35 should be an age where I feel differently but hey ho that’s what’s happened.
I feel older, not just a year older than when I turned 34, but older in the way that I can’t stay out late on a regular basis and that staying up until 11pm is “a late one”. I look back on my life and think that although school wasn’t the happiest of times for me, the world seemed so much simpler, work was something your parents did, pubs were the holy grail and money troubles were not having enough pocket money to buy the latest Nike trainers.
Now everything seems far too real, I see the struggles of my parents are now my struggles, My friends need me for support for illness or family deaths rather than for a game on the commodore 64. As a kid anything seems possible, whereas as an adult the realities of life seem to beat the dreams out of you and the only way you can see beyond this is the wholly unlikely lottery win we all dream about.
You see dreams change as you become an adult. I cannot put a date or even a year when this changes as you “grow up” I think it must be different for everyone but it seems to coincide with the realisation that life is not as easy as you think it is when a kid and the denial lasts different amounts of time for different people.
These days my non-lottery win dreams are very meagre. I want to sell my house and move into a family home where we can eat at a dining table as a family. I want quality time with the wife and the kids. I want quality time with my wife alone. I want quality time with my friends. I want my family and friends to be healthy and happy.
Slightly different from those you have as a kid but seemingly just as difficult to achieve!
We all get into our routines and life zips by in a flash. Routines are necessary in anyone’s life but they can also be destructive to lives as well. It all gets too easy to not go out to see friends, not do the normal on a particular night. We are all guilty of it and sometimes we don’t even realise we are doing it but we do.
How many times have you gone out thinking what’s the point, or I don’t feel like it or I’m not in the mood for a laugh and they have been the best nights out?
I realised today that sometimes as adults we need to be the people we are underneath, maybe the children we are underneath. If I had to label myself and try this yourself, I would say I’m a husband, a dad, and employee, a homeowner, a car owner.
But when I look at this, it’s not who I am. I am all of these things of course but that doesn’t include me. To put this into words is difficult, but some of you will know what I mean. More and more rarely in recent years the real me doesn’t get an airing.
The days and nights where I don’t have to be a dad or any of the other things that prevent me from being the child that stays within us all.
It’s the nights out with your friends when they can leave all of these things at the door as well where I feel more like myself and for those brief moments all the realities of life get left at the door.
I wouldn’t describe myself as having a midlife crisis, more a midlife realisation that much of my life, at least for now won’t change, no matter how much I want it to.
But it ain’t all bad and that’s the truth of it, Life can be shit sometimes but not all the time, so remember to take the time to be yourselves sometimes and keep yourself sane! And for those not understanding what the hell I’m talking about……your still young so enjoy it while it lasts x
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