We all have days that,as the saying goes,live in infamy. Somewhere in each of our histories is a day that divides time into the time before and the time after, and that we can recall just what it was we were doing when the event took place. December 7,1941.November 22,1963. And my own personal day, because of the unique time of my birth.September 11,2001. Thus, its tempting to begin the story there. But that would be the wrong place.
It's hard to know when one should begin writing reflectively about their life.Forty?Fifty?One hundred? Surely by then. But for me it doesn't seem that I'd gained much wisdom by forty.I hadn't really had many of the hard things in life weighing me down,and when I did,I just shook them off and got on with life. So that infamous day is really just a distraction, though indeed every day after has been different from every day before and we live in a different world now. no,for me it took a few more years to reach what I considered middle age, and I wasn't sure I'd gained much wisdom along the way.
Then the world started changing.Not in a historical sense.History has an inflated sense of self importance,I think.Not only do the winners write it, but by and large it doesn't mean that much to average people.Not until it becomes personal, when you can see that things past may have been different, and you realize how. When all the constant things in life begin to fall by the way. And then you realize that you need to take the lessons of the past with you, to create a future,and that the future has the possibility of overcoming the past, and being better.But it's a struggle and life never seems to turn just the way you imagined that it might, or even should. Then everyday brings new revelations and wisdom.but is wisdom ever really for the one who thinks they've attained it?
Calgary,in the late months of 2005 and the early part of 2006,is the time of my waking up in winter,when the changes came wholesale,and there was yet perhaps another fifty years to live.God only knows,but I'm going to need all I've learned, all those times have shown me. I was nagged in the years just before by a single thought. It spoke in my head saying"Before it's all over,I'd like to do just one good thing." Now I see,that despite loss, it's possible to do many.
It's hard to know when one should begin writing reflectively about their life.Forty?Fifty?One hundred? Surely by then. But for me it doesn't seem that I'd gained much wisdom by forty.I hadn't really had many of the hard things in life weighing me down,and when I did,I just shook them off and got on with life. So that infamous day is really just a distraction, though indeed every day after has been different from every day before and we live in a different world now. no,for me it took a few more years to reach what I considered middle age, and I wasn't sure I'd gained much wisdom along the way.
Then the world started changing.Not in a historical sense.History has an inflated sense of self importance,I think.Not only do the winners write it, but by and large it doesn't mean that much to average people.Not until it becomes personal, when you can see that things past may have been different, and you realize how. When all the constant things in life begin to fall by the way. And then you realize that you need to take the lessons of the past with you, to create a future,and that the future has the possibility of overcoming the past, and being better.But it's a struggle and life never seems to turn just the way you imagined that it might, or even should. Then everyday brings new revelations and wisdom.but is wisdom ever really for the one who thinks they've attained it?
Calgary,in the late months of 2005 and the early part of 2006,is the time of my waking up in winter,when the changes came wholesale,and there was yet perhaps another fifty years to live.God only knows,but I'm going to need all I've learned, all those times have shown me. I was nagged in the years just before by a single thought. It spoke in my head saying"Before it's all over,I'd like to do just one good thing." Now I see,that despite loss, it's possible to do many.
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