Today I am 40

[4_2_it]

I thought about doing an "Ask Me" thread, but figured just sharing a few short life observations on this occasion might make more sense. (If this turns into an Ask Me thread I will not be disappointed.) OOT MODS -- If this is better suited for the Lounge, then please move it there.

My philosophy has always been that age is juts a number and you are only as old as you feel. However, now that I have hit what many consider to be a milestone, I find myself reflecting on the first half of my life.

I have many things to be grateful for. I have a loving (and IMO hot) wife that has put up with me for 16 years. 2 beautiful daughters who I love more than words can convey. Finally, I have enough friends to fill up my house yesterday for a birthday dinner.

I have what many would consider to be a great situation and I am very thankful for it. Of course, my life is not perfect and there are things I wish I could change, but on the whole, I have to admit that the last few years have been one of the happiest periods of my life. I am truly blessed in this regard.

I really do not have a secret. I try to appreciate every day and live in the moment as much as possible. That doesn't mean doing things that you will regret later. It means taking the time to do the things that you would later regret not doing.

For example, yesterday evening I was playing cards with my buddies when my oldest daughter asked me to proof read her short essay. I know proofing homework is SOP for most parents, but my daughter and I had a very good 8 minute philosophical discussion on the meaning of freedom based on her short paragraphs. It's not a topic I would ever have brought up on my own because, quite frankly, it never would have occurred to me to do so. Anyway that's just a very small example of what I am referencing.

At the risk of making this entirely TLDR material here is one of my favorite poems that sums up much of my life philosophy these days:

Robert Frost
The Road Not Taken

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.