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Tag: life

thirty

It’s just a number; it doesn’t define how I really feel.

Twenty years ago, I turned 10. Ten years ago, I became 20. I don’t remember my decennial birthdays or what happened on each of them. It’s possible I had a party when I was 10. I might have been with friends or taking finals when I was 20. Now comes my third decennial birthday.

When I was thinking to my future so long ago, I could have imagined it in many different ways. Maybe I would be a successful musician or audio engineer. Maybe I would be a doctor. I never had a clue what I wanted to be when I “grow up”.

From a biased look on the outside of nearly thirty years of life, it seems like I’ve had so much time to leave a legacy. I was given countless opportunities and time to do whatever I wanted. I’ve had a blessed life to make so many memories.

But no, I’m not where I could be. I’m not where I thought I’d be. I also have little regret about my choices. My destiny hasn’t caught up with me, not yet at least. Web design is my easiest path, but I hesitate to leave the music and entertainment world. However, these decisions and choices will be made soon. My life is changing.

If you told me that I was thirty years old, I would laugh in your face and exclaim, “Big deal!”. That number means nothing to me especially considering I don’t feel my age.

I’m not old, I’m just experienced. It’s time to put this experience to good use.

Goodbye, my reckless and irresponsible twenties. I enjoyed you as much as I could when I finally realized age doesn’t stop. You weren’t always good to me but I made the best of you.

Hello, thirties. You’re gonna bring me the best years of my life. I know aging will make my life better, so I expect a lot more out of you. Just don’t give up on me when I fail. You can remind me I’m better for being here. I promise I’ll do my best to enjoy you more than I’ve ever enjoyed my life.

the chronicles of my life

During the first two months of my sophomore year in high school, I was inspired to keep a journal. My closest friend was doing it, so monkey see, monkey do. It was a useful way to keep track of my life, to practice my writing, and to get out thoughts and feelings I would not otherwise express externally.

For the record, it was not a diary. Diaries are for girls: Journals are for boys.

I kept journals for the rest of high school and into college. After the first year, however, my desire to record my life waned. I didn’t feel a need to write down as much as I did before, and it took me a while to realize why this was. I initially credited this to keeping busy or being lazy. Writing everything down became a burden and chore and it did not represent the same things it did in high school. So I stopped.

The truth is… I never stopped writing. My journaling took on another form, one I didn’t realize until a few years later.

When I began my first semester of college, one of the first things I began using was the relatively new-to-me medium called e-mail. I think I first discovered e-mail when my mom started using AOL in the mid 90’s. I didn’t really think much of it and was much more interested in the capability of talking to my friends online instantly. But e-mail quickly became a favorite way to communicate with my friends when I couldn’t IM.

School transitioned my habits and relationship with e-mail. As per the instructions from the IT office, I setup Outlook Express to download all my mail from the server so that I could store it on my computer. In 1997, I doubt we were given much storage space in which to store e-mail archives.

This practice of downloading my e-mail never changed, even with the rise of web based systems such as hotmail and yahoo. I always wanted to store my mail on my computer since there were times I would receive mail that I wanted to refer back to, even if it was just for nostalgic reasons.

E-mail became my journal. The fact that I am able to keep everything I receive and send is my log. To this day, I have thousands of e-mails and over 10 years worth of it sitting in my Outlook Express. I don’t save everything written to me or sent to others, but I always try to save meaningful mail, whether good or bad, to represent those moments in my life. This is also a way for me to jog my memory about someone I haven’t spoken to in a while or to recall certain things we said to each other.

I still have my journals boxed away. It’ll be interesting to someday get back into those and read the memories I kept and see what I said about the things I did, the girl I dated and the people who affected my life. I sure hope I surprise myself; I hardly remember much of what I wrote but I do remember the way I wrote and how I kept track of certain things.

Keeping track of my life is more important than ever. Realizing how quickly my memories fade scares me.