What is midlife crisis? Well, I know what it feels like even if I don’t know what it is. It’s a very selfish feeling let me tell you. And it’s deceptive; terribly deceptive. I feel like I can just reach out and grab what I want, and more than what I want, what I’ve fantasized about and treasured in my innermost self. And I guess that’s the point. When we see the end of life in sight, or perhaps are too far from our beginning of life, we begin to realize that whatever special vision has been inside us may never ever see the light of day. Thus it becomes time to put up or shut up, even if the vision ends up being you in a red sports car with a girl who really doesn’t care about you.

And do you care about her? Probably not. Or if you do then it’s not really her you care about but an image. For really caring about someone is a product of work. Time. Effort. That much I know. Caring isn’t being pleased by someone, it’s a connection born of someone being there for you and you for them. It’s proof.

Oh, it’s fun to be pleased and I am as capable of being seduced by that as anyone. Hell, more so. I feel the need to be pleased terribly strongly these days. I want to taste it, to dive in and get what’s mine, even as I know the result would likely be bad, sad, hurtful and devastating. I still see a vision, a fantasy tantalizing me. I guess because I have sought fantasies in my life and I fear I may never achieve them, they are kind of trying to achieve me now.

Middle-aged madness is sorrowful. It does bad things. But it comes from nice memories of walking down the street and seeing the green of the trees. It comes from wanting things simple, wanting what you want, what feels good and easy. It comes from wanting the sense that there is no real hardness to life and you never will die or suffer or want. You need that feeling, you crave that feeling. And one day you won’t ever have a chance at it or anything else.

I look at myself in the mirror and I keep pulling back the skin around my face. I want to look like the boy I was. I can’t imagine not looking that way even though I know that I don’t. I’m still though fooling myself when I look in the mirror, still believing I’m 25. Wish I’d been happier when I was 25. I was damned good looking.

Life isn’t fair. Of course it never has been for anyone. But is there a way to come to terms with this? To feel at peace with this feeling that I have? Well, obviously people do. And I will. Or die trying.