Growing Up

As a child I could not wait to grow up, and looked forward to being taller, older, and smarter.  When I became a teenager I wanted to be cooler, accepted, and attractive to the opposite sex.  Young adulthood brought on a new set of concerns.  Hormones ran amok, parties were wild, and life was there to be tasted.  Middle age was about raising kids, creating a home, keeping your job, paying bills, going to church, and living life the way you thought you should...or at least the way your parents told you.

I am grown up now, am taller, older and hopefully smarter.  I accept who I am, am not as excited about how attractive I am to the opposite sex, and being cooler is something that happens to me in the fall.  Hormones have slowed to a crawl, I have parties of one, and cooking is a passion that supplies the tastes needed.  Kids are raised, I pay my bills, am employed, my church is within me (my soul) and I live my life with all that I have.

I cry daily as I am constantly touched by words in a song, seeing homeless people seeking shelter, animals being abused, sunrises and sunsets, leaves falling, snowflakes piling up, and grand babies learning to walk.  With practice I have learned to smile at adversity, grin at pain, accept the bad, and strive to make things better.  Life has dealt me a myriad of cards to play and the card gods have laughed often as they see me struggle to play my hand.  In the words of the late Wayne Dyer, "I am as perfect as I can be right now".  I will keep trying to be better, but I am a work in progress and by no stretch am I done growing.

Time stops for no one.  2017 is here and I hope to make it better than 2016.