I can remember turning 21. It was nice. I had a surprise birthday. My mother threw it for me as she had for my brother three years earlier. I was definitely surprised.

That was over 35 years ago. It is not likely I will live another 36 years so, if I can imagine myself at age 21, I can’t imagine myself where I am now. So to speak.

So… I’m already dead.

You play these games sometimes. It’s hard not to. Growing old is cruel. Mostly because it’s inevitable and it’s, well, inevitable. It just is. You know, you see it, you feel it, but it just goes on, day to day.

And it’s really hard to take. In a way, it’s hard because you’re inviting it by living day to day. See, you’re getting up every day; you’re going to work or whatever; you’re running through your inevitable which leads to THE inevitable. You are process and at some point the process becomes more important than you. It’s at that point you realize that you are old and (slowly hopefully) on the way out.

But it is truly impossible to really see yourself that way, that is to see yourself as over, done, deceased. It just doesn’t work to have a thought of your own non-existence. I can never come to terms with my mortality. And I’m not even raging against the dying of the light. I’m just not accepting delivery of it. Denying it? Hardly. I know it exists. In fact, that’s why I’m pushing it so far away. I know it’s there.

I guess what worries me more than just the ending is the lack of accomplishment. What was it for? What is my legacy? What was the point of it all? Sure, Jean Paul… No point. But you have to then make up your own, and I did. I’m just afraid I won’t get there.

And in a way I’m afraid I will since that would mean a big sigh and a lot of relaxation.

You know where that leads…