Monday, March 20, 2006

Oh, Boy, It's the Big Five-Oh

A week from today, I’m going to be fifty years old. Rather than thinking about how I’m so old (which I’m pretty sure I’m not), I’d rather focus on the stuff I’ve experienced so far, which I’m pleased to say is considerable. Here is a list, which I may add to as the week goes by:

~ Lived on the Navajo Nation

~ Written a book

~ Had really incredible sex

~ Sliced head cheese for the mob

~ Been clean and sober for over 24 years

~ Been married and divorced

~ Had a child

~ Been thin (and not)

~ Lived in New Jersey, Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, Massachusetts, Oklahoma, and Georgia

~ Traveled for 6,000 miles, pretty much nonstop, on a Greyhound bus.

~ Gone to law school

~ Driven a pick-up truck (this week, in fact!)

~ Been Presbyterian, Jewish, Quaker, and pagan (all at the same time, even)

~ Lived in a trailer

~ Had cats, dogs, turtles, tortoises, fish, horses, gerbils, hamsters, and guinea pigs

~ Earned money as a writer

~ Practiced law in a big firm

~ Swam in the ocean

~ Been picked up by a professional gambler outside Las Vegas

~ Read and written pornography

~ Been published

~ Been saved by a nun

~ Sung on stage in two countries

~ Seen two musicals on Broadway

~ Done musical comedy

~ Learned to play several musical instruments at least a little

~ Quit smoking

~ Taught in graduate school

~ Worked for an answering service, nursing home, hospital, hotel, drug store, college, federal judge, and law school

~ Been inside the cab of a big rig

~ Flown in a helicopter

~ Grown tomatoes

~ Been a live-in nanny

~ Been on television at least twice (once dressed in large puppet suit and once interviewed)

~ Have been two degrees removed from Jimmy Hoffa and the Dalai Lama (not through the same person!)

~ Known writers, singers, pharmacists, doctors, actors, strippers, prostitution madams, and a phone-sex operator

Ok, so this isn’t so awfully bad for 50 years, although I confess I’ve just done little dabs of a lot of the things on my list. Most of it came just by my being open to new experiences, but that’s been a lot harder to do in the past few years. So for my next decade, I ask the Goddess to keep me open to whatever She may have in store.

So... what's on your list?

7 comments:

  1. Happy Birthday. My list isn't nearly as impressive as yours.

    I'd wish you a happy "other" birthday if I knew the date. Happy 24 anyhow. I turned 26 in December but I have a few years on you. You got smarter sooner.

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  2. Anonymous9:25 AM

    wishing many happy returns and lots of pretty, sparkly, gifty, thingys on your birthday....

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  3. Ooooh, Mr. Brian, I could definitely use some sparkly things about now -- it will cover the hay in my hair!

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  4. Happy birthday!

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  5. Not bad! It's great!

    "Sliced head cheese for the mob" requires a story I'm afraid.

    And Happy Birthday my dear.

    I'm 55 this year and have thoroughly enjoyed the 50's - somehow it's a free time... and my list is pretty cool too. Maybe I'll come back and leave it.

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  6. The only thing on my wish list is to be as cool as you sound! Great blog.

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