Tuesday, March 14, 2006

Four Dozen Years

I turned 4 dozen years old today. For some reason 4 dozen doesn't sound like as big a number as 48. I guess I could celebrate the 27th anniversary of my 21st birthday. I remember celebrating my father's 45th birthday and thinking "Wow, Dad's getting old." You know something, I was more right than I knew.

My dear wife is fond of telling me "You are only as old as you feel." I usually respond with "Well, I feel old."

I can usually sum up my feeling about my age with my favorite line from the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark - "Its not the years, it's the mileage."

In keeping with a long standing tradition of mine I took the day off today. I have not attended class or showed up for work on my birthday since I was in 9th grade. In high school and collage my birthday fell either on a weekend, spring break, or for two years on snow days. Once I got out of school and started working I found that I prefered to take the day off. Sleep in, have a "bad for me" breakfast, watch a movie, read a book, play golf, nap, whatever. It's a day off to do nothing.

This morning I had to skip the sleeping in part. I had to have the van over at the repair shop at 7:30 this morning. So I delivered the van then got a couple frosted donuts and a large white chocolate cappuccino for breakfast. Then I watch a couple hours of the first season of 24. I wandered out to the golf course this afternoon to hit a bucket of balls and work on my putting. It was really windy or I would have played a round. The family and I went out to dinner at a Chineese Buffet and then came back home. We're watching a couple episodes of season 2 of Babylon 5 and then we're having homemade carrot cake to celebrate.

It's been a pretty good day even if it meant I had to get a year older. But like I told my mother in law a while back "Birthday's are good for you. The more of them you have the longer you live."

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Four score and eight??
Yes, you are getting old (er), But then, the alternative is not all that much fun I expect.
How well I remember the many times you and your cousins razzed me about being 'older'.. Like "Hey, Moses!", etc.
Good golly Miss Molly, I was coming back from Venezuela at 48. It seems only like a short time ago..but isn't.
Time IS fleeting.
I had something profound to write, but haven't 'found' it rattling about in my mind so will simply say Happy Birthday. Unc

Anonymous said...

Happy birthday, puppy!

MC
(55)

Erik Rader said...

Happy Belated B-Day!!!