A year of life changes

Published on Thursday, October 22nd, 2015


I'm sure I'm not alone in having periods of restless sleep and insomnia.
This particular night, I gave up early and went out into the living
room. Exhausted I sat down on the sofa and stared blankly at the autumn
night on the other side of the window. My mind started to meander along
the path of the subjects on how time is fleeting and the inevitable end
of it all. (Yeah.)

I haven't had a crisis turning 30. I am who I am, I've done what I've
done, and it's just vain to bash my head against the closed door of
"what-ifs". But I'd lie if I said that I'm completely unaffected by the
fact that my recent birthday changed two digits to my age. It's an
ice-cold reminder that time does indeed march on and couldn't give a
shit that your self-perception as a "twenty-something", in just one tick
of the clock, is null and void. It's jarring.

So I shrugged and closed my slackened jaw. No matter. At least I managed
to squeeze in the marriage to the love of my life and the birth of my
first child before the fated date.

I can't say much about married life. Don't get me wrong, I love it, but
it hasn't exactly changed me. For us, marriage was more or less a move
of formality: we knew damn well we wanted to spend our lives together,
and no slip of paper would make a difference to that. Thing is, that
slip of paper does a hell lot more when it comes legal matters, and
especially when you're having a kid.

The birth of my son was by far the most wonderful and awesome
life-changing event I've ever experienced. Well, the event itself was a
confused mess of sleep-deprivation, frustration, fear and joy, but the
very fact that he's here has rewritten me from the core.
Suddenly, I can't escape. I can't beat the system. I must do what needs
to be done, and I need to do it _well_. It's the challenge of my life,
and I feel more than ready to take it on. This newfound self-confidence
has rubbed off on other aspects in my life too: my tolerance for
bullshit has vanished, I don't have this low-key buzz of self-doubt any
longer and I feel that I matter. I've also gotten this amazing ability
to focus totally on anything that needs to be done, and an acute sober
realization that everything regarding my life is a matter of me doing
it or not.

I guess the latter point is something that has fueled my aforementioned
upset feelings, since up until then, everything has sort of... just
happened. It's exhilarating and I've never felt more alive.

I tear my gaze from the window and return to bed. With a smile playing
on my lips and accompanied by the sleeping sounds of my family, I think
to myself that I really, really love everything that has happened to me
this passing year, and that I’m the luckiest guy alive.

<3 jzp