new things

I found an old journal from high school. The entries feel awkward and painfully earnest- cringe is the term one could use- but they are real, unfettered, and filled with a sense of absolute certainty. As a teenager, everything feels immediate and intense because it’s never been felt before and there’s no possible way anybody else could be having These Big Feelings. Only later do you realize EVERY ONE OF YOUR FRIENDS was having those Big Feelings. In my writing, the only thing bigger than my feelings were my plans for my future. A numbered list was nearly printed in the front cover and continued through the 2nd page.

(Un)fortunately, I shared this journal with my daughter & we had tears in our eyes laughing through some of the entries. I let her keep it, but now she claims to have never seen it. I am wagering she took it to share with friends and it was misplaced. I’d be terrified to tell me, too, but it’s a Big Emotion I’d hug her through because those pages show I knew as little about the world as we all do at the tender age of 15, 16, 17. The thing about that journal & the dreams within its pages is that I completed very few of them, but I also have done things I had yet to know existed or that I’d love.

At 51 years old I’m just beginning to live a whole new version of another life. People talk about getting older, bodies hurting, and the word ‘can’t’ seems to generously pepper to many conversations. I recently had someone ask me, “Why are you doing so much? What are you training for?” I had to smile because I have barely gotten started, but I answered, “I’m training to be able to do whatever I damn well please when I am 90.”

I am blessed to have avoided injuries or to have worn out parts of my factory model, but that’s in part because I was not a sports kid. I was fairly strong and had decent endurance while in the Navy, but didn’t really start getting into strong condition until my kid was a toddler and I decided to train for a Tough Mudder race. Then single parenting hit and I more or less stopped. Then got serious about Krav Maga for a few years. Then Covid stopped the world. Now, I am getting going again with weight lifting, learning to breathe fire, and reconnecting to dance.

I can’t wait to see what unfolds when I have access to a strong body I’ve built to climb, lift, dance, swim far better than most people ”my age” who made choices not to find the new things, but to regret what they never did.

Keep moving. Live Large. Don’t say can’t.