something new

Recently, one of our friends told us, "When I turned 30, I learned how to ride a bike.  I started trying the things I was always afraid of doing.  If it don't do them now, when will I?"

I could totally relate.  I have a feeling this "Why the hell not?" attitude extends to many.  Maybe you don't have to turn 30, but at some point you want to experience the things you've denied yourself, out of fear, out of apathy.

 

I turned 30.  2 months later, I ran the Opasquayak Indian Days race.  The last time I lined up for that run was 15 years ago.  It was a great run.  Hard and fast.  I may have even run it better than I did at 15.  I spent half the race next to a girl whose name I love (Samantha Caribou).  I did not run it last year, when my sister did.  I don't know if I'd race against her.  Run with her, yeah, but race?  Who knows, maybe my attitude will change when I'm 31.  Or 40.

I turned 30.  One month later, I had my knees up to my chin, feet strapped to a board.  Wakeboarding.  My excitement jittered over my nerves, ruled over the scared.  Darc and Jord laughed, disbelieving, as I cut back and forth over the wake, dipsy-doodling, changing direction.  After that first run, too dumb to know that I did it well, I was hooked.  Two weeks later, I pulled Steve up.  Summer romance blossomed.  Hopefully that loving feeling returns next year.

"I will drink life to the lees/ (...) Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough/ Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades/ For ever and for ever when I move. / How dull it is to pause, to make an end, / To rust unburnished, not to shine in use! / As though to breathe were life. (...) Come my friends, / 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world. (...)"                                            -Ulysses, Alfred Lord Tennyson