Yet, “youth is wasted on the young.”
I hate that first idiom. Always have. To me, it implies that life isn’t meant to be enjoyed.
Me having the time to knit, cycle, climb, hike, camp or even build an obscenely large gingerbread house isn’t an accident. I actively make time to do all that stuff. My dream is to challenge myself in fun ways and have adventures. Fun is good!
I realize that hard and not-so-fun work is sometimes necessary to achieve what you really want.
But for how long? Is the payoff really going to be greater than the suffering?
Think college is boring and stressful? Why put yourself through five years of that? Stressful but interesting? I get. But boring?! If you already know that you hate your prospective career, get out of there!
Suppose I were to get a well-paying but awful job where I’ll spend more than 40 hours a week, so that I can purchase my dream home, are my hobbies going to change? Probably not. If I can enjoy my hobbies now, as an apartment-dweller, and have what some like to call “way too much time on [my] hands” then I’ve already got it all figured out. Yeah?
Not even middle-aged and I have my life all figured out!
Or not.
Sometimes I do wish I had the desire to follow the generic life blueprint.
- Graduate high school (which I did do, but not by choice)
- College/University/Trade School
- Career
- Marriage
- Acquisition of property
- Kids
- Demand that your now-adult kids give you grandkids
- Retire
It just seems like it’d be easier if I were actually content with doing what’s socially acceptable. Alas, none of that appeals to me, except for #3 but only if I could have a cool career like “cookie architect” or teaming up with Yann to make custom bikes (he’d build the frames, and I’d paint them!).
Retirement is supposed to be when civilization gives you permission to have “way too much time on your hands”. I just don’t see myself being able to enjoy climbing when I’m 70. Shit, I already have osteoarthritis. I also have Raynaud’s Syndrome, which will only get worse as I get older. Aaaaaand I’m bipolar, ugh/yay!
As I’m now in my crusty mid-30s, I’ve started to get more serious about warming up before activities like climbing and cycling. I’m now incorporating super-boring antagonist-muscle training in my warm-ups. For climbing, to suppress the tennis elbow injury, I’ve been doing reverse wrist curls. For cycling, I do stabilization squats and lunges.
So, yes, sometimes you need to do boring stuff to keep your life enjoyable. I just don’t want to spend most of my life suffering in hopes ofmaybe enjoying my “twilight years”.
I know I’m not even close to being “old”. In fact, I’m still being referred to as a “girl”. Today the guy who collects the greasy rags from the bike shop did his bimonthly visit, and asked Yann if I was deaf. He didn’t know my name, so I was “the girl”.
In strangers’ eyes, I’m always a girl. Would “that lilac-haired free spirit with the awesome tattoos” have been too specific? How many people am I supposed to menstruate on before I am considered a woman?!
Anyway, I shall conclude my daily blueprint with sleep. Zzz.
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