Ever sit down and really listen to the lyrics of a song? I mean really listen to them and once you do, you realize how much truth can be found in those lyrics? I did that just now with “The Logical Song” by Supertramp. It encapsulates something I have felt my whole life, especially now that I am an “adult”. I believe it was originally written to describe the writer’s school days, but it fits, almost in a claustrophobic way, to what I feel now. We first come into the world with this bright eyed optimism and a sense of wonder about the smallest things. Maybe it is a thunderstorm, maybe it is the chill of a winter’s night or even just watching the sun set. The feeling of possibilities and knowing you have more years ahead of you than behind. (Although when you are young, time has no meaning; I mean the days seem long and sometimes the nights even longer). We have this free form being, this babe in the woods whose main concern is the thoughts and the feelings of the young. Not that I was this perfect creature of love and light. I had issues, I had depression and I had this deep desire to do something important with my life, whatever that was.
We are then molded, formed by our life and our social and economical place in it. Our parents, Lord love them, fill us with their insecurities and their fears. We see too many drinks taken, too many arguments that ended with anger that sat in the house like a heavy press. School teaches us the basics. Our social circles teach us what they expect of us. We are pressurized and cauterized and made into this being that is expected to follow a certain path, to make better for yourself. Still, that hunger and that wonder still hangs in there. It is your friend. It makes you look at things at a different light. Life is light. You are the the solar panel that is supposed to soak in all in and convert it into the energy, the love to follow your dreams. However, things change.
This is not to say I am blaming the outside world for my issues. Anything that has gone wrong in my life has been my fault. I admit to it. I am saying however, that the world and your place in it definitively marks you and can tilt the scales in favor of losses instead of gains. The bright eyed kid slowly turns into this cynical, unhappy man that has more years behind him that he has ahead of him. I have been crystallized, trained to worry about bills, pay raises and survival. We all have to do that, but it makes me so mad that all of this has come at the sacrifice of the child inside me that is screaming to come back to the forefront. Creativity isn’t dead, but it is on life support and the voice inside my head tells me what I can’t do instead of what I could do. I am not saying I feel this way all the time, but the older I get, these thoughts creep in more and more like the arthritis I have and all the other aches and pains that seem to be increasing with every passing year.
The question I have is how to I get my spark back? How do I kick start creativity when I have suppressed it for so long. How do you break chains that were form more years ago that I care to remember? Our pod cast that Rando and Pancho do helps me a lot. It makes me feel connected to something and to people that I love very much.
My one big issue, which I am sure most people would tell me, is that I refuse to grow up. That is so ironic with all the previous words I have just written. I am a shell of a person some days. We all feel like that. Overwhelmed and under appreciated. That is why I need to keep doing this podcast and to post. I need to make this connection that I cannot make with people I physically live near. I need to try and fire up that spark again. I believe I will, I just need a way to go back to my youth at least spiritually and mentally. Think of the things I can do and not what I cannot. It will happen. Today was just one of those days that a song sparked a lot of thoughts. I am sitting and listening to “Take the Long way Home” now and trying not to get any more ideas.
Anyway, take care and I hope everyone stays safe.
Lefty
Mid-Life Crisis Task Force 