The Xenos Chronicles: It's About Time

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The Xenos Chronicles

Formerly the Xenon Chronicles

It’s About Time

 

It’s about time.

 

It’s about balance.

 

It’s about making a living instead of a dying.

 

I was 50 years old on my last birthday. One look and you know I’ve been around a half century. I am hopefully a little wiser. I can’t say for sure. What I know is, I am aware of what I don’t know. Some call that wisdom. Others call it a misspent life. The fact is that I’m here now.

 

People’s opinions of me are varied. Some think that I am witty, some think I’m clever, and by now, a few think I’m a horse’s a*s. Good for all of them. They are thinking. Their ability to think places them in the top percentages of America’s population. When Morpheus offered Neo the pill he says “This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back.....You take the blue pill, the story ends. You wake up and believe... whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill.... you stay in wonderland... and I show you just how deep the rabbit hole goes.” (Wachowski, 2000). I think many Americans took the blue pill. In fact, I believe Mr. President and his cronies overdosed on blues but that’s another story. We all have to make a conscious decision. We either take the blue pill and go with the flow or take the red and end up on the cutting edge of the e-ride called life. I say it’s about time.

 

This story is about us; you and me. If you’re reading this, you decided somewhere in your life that a red pill was your ticket. Writers, painters, sculptors, musicians and other artisans unite. We are the thinkers and perhaps the prophets for the 21^st century. Whoa there! Don’t be in such a hurry. For everything you do in the world, there is a price to be paid. Every decision you make, you will pay for, at one time or another in your life. Weigh those choices carefully, so in the end you can smile and say “It was worth it!” Some of the greatest prophets, Jesus of Nazareth, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, all ended up dead before their time. If you’re a prophet, you’re automatically a certified-boat rocker. Emma Goldman got off light. She was deported.

 

The problem is that now that you’ve made a conscious decision to think, you can’t go back. There is no back. You can try and escape. You’ll find that drugs and alcohol can be a hell of their own. The only other way I know to get out is the Big Cop Out or Grand Finale. Just make sure you climb in the bathtub and cut your wrists vertically, not horizontally. The bathtub makes for easy clean up. The vertical cut is a guaranteed one way trip. If this seems a little raw, then you are fortunate. You can feel as well as think. I have either first hand experience or have been an eyewitness to a lot of ugliness in life.

 

We humans are an interesting species. We learn by polarities. In so far as we give ourselves to the dark, we find the light, to fear, we find safety to ugliness we find beauty. This half I have experienced a lot of beauty. I like waterfalls, sunshine, candlelight and deep abiding intimacy with both genders, without bedding either one.

 

I’ve had some disappointments in my life too. I thought that enlightenment was a destination. It’s not. It is a new beginning. Enlightenment means I am awake enough to know I’m awake enough to no longer sleepwalk. My first comment was “Wow!”  My second comment was “What the hell do I do now?” Well, in part I’m doing it and you’re reading it. Perhaps I am wise. Perhaps I am a warehouse of archaic trivia looking for an outlet. I’m not sure. Of only three things, I am certain; death, taxes and change. They come to us all, ready or not.

 

Life is dynamic and always in flux. When I was young say 18 or so, I had the world on a string. My parents were dumb as rocks. I had all the answers in the world. Then something really extraordinary happened. By the age of 25, I realized that having all the answers wasn’t always a good thing, particularly when life changes all the questions. Now, this is the incredible part: in seven short years my parents seemed to move from grade school and had graduated cum laude from Yale, Harvard, Stanford or some other noble institution. They had really gotten smart; really, really smart. I never underestimated them again.

 

The fact is that when I was 25 years old, I thought, just wait. When I’m 50 or so, I’ll really have it together. Yeah right. Now I’m thinking when I’m 75 or so… I’m smiling anyway. I’m here and daily say a prayer of gratitude to SHIM for my ever changing life. I worked for 30 years in most manual type jobs, sales, customer service and the like. This represents a checker board of job experiences. It represents a family raised. It represents gray hair and many more aches and pains than I had 30 years ago. The only work I really enjoyed, that was really fun was what I am doing now. I’m a fitness instructor for 60+ year olds, most 25 to 30 years older than me and can still kick my butt… figuratively speaking of course. I know how to make a dying… work hard at jobs you hate and for no more thanks than a paycheck. Today, I really enjoy my work and I love my older adults. They are a breath of fresh air. I used to be a perfectionist. Now I laugh at my imperfections.

 

I ask myself something pretty often these days. I ask “what took me so long?”  Back in ’92, I asked that same question to Art Stone, my AA sponsor. Art’s gone now but I still remember him smiling at me. He replied gently: “You weren’t ready. You wouldn’t have appreciated what you have now if you had it back then.” I get a knot in my throat when I think about Old Art. He was a frail, old fart. He smoked unfiltered cigarettes while he relied on an oxygen tank for breath. Art was a living dichotomy. He was an old recovering alcoholic who admittedly did some really stupid things in life. Yet, he made sense to me. I hadn’t drunk a drop in 13 years prior to going to AA. But I was what the program called a “dry drunk.” I had all the stinking thinking without the booze. Art and I were a pair. I miss him.

 

The teacher really does appear when the student is ready. My best teacher today is Corra. Corra is my four year old granddaughter with deep insight way beyond her years and the eyes of someone ancient. They are deep, penetrating brown eyes that don’t just look at you; they see deep inside, touching both heart and soul. You can’t keep anything hidden from her. When she looks inside people, she knows, she knows. It is true that a child will lead them. I say, it’s about time. But more so, it’s about keeping balance in my life.

 

So here I am. I’m a 50 year old college student working on my encore career. I like that word, encore. The world is always in flux. Social Security, which I have paid into for the last 39 years is drying up and dying on the vine. I have no retirement. It may sound crazy but I’m glad I don’t. Every male in my family died in their mid to late 60’s and shortly after they retired. For many of us work a day people, retirement has become a euphemism for a time to die. I’ve got no plans to ever retire. Encore career is a euphemism for working until you die. That’s okay. I like it and want it that way. But if I am going to have it that way, there has to be a balance.

 

For years, I performed back breaking labor for a paycheck. I worked and the boss who reaped the rewards of my labor figured giving me a paycheck was all the thanks I deserved. I worked jobs I hated. I could have told the boss to take the job and shove it, but it wasn’t what you did if you had a family support. Duty, honor, family kept me working day after day, year after year. The harder I worked, the more the boss expected of me. The boss shoved thousands of dollars in profit into his back pocket. Those that worked for him were lucky if he hosted a Christmas party at the local pizza stand.

 

But times have changed. We Baby Boomers that worked so hard can’t do it anymore. We are tired but not undone. You won’t find us locked in an old people’s home. We want freedom. We want respect for the years of experience. We want the choice of jobs we take and the opportunity to enjoy our families, bounce our grandchildren on our laps and take a ski vacation at Mt. Hood or Tahoe. Life is about balance; work, play, pain, joy. This is our way. We are the generation that listened to music at Woodstock, got stoned with our friends and talked of peace and acted in free love. Our president got inaugurated to the beat of Fleetwood Mac. Our parents said we were incorrigible. We are the first generation to share our music with our kids. Some of today’s top remix music was birthed in our generation and we’re very proud of it. We still have a lot to give but now we demand balance. All work and no play makes Jack and Jill dull children. Our generation is anything but dull.  

 

Life has taught me that it’s a good idea to find something that makes your heart sing and make a living (as versus a dying) with it. I like working with older adults. There is just something about them. They have eyes… ancient eyes that see deep inside…

 

I pleased to be a writer and join in the ranks of the prophets of the new age. I am obsessed and I think if you’re living, truly living, having an obsession or two is a good thing. I like feeling alive. Yes, for me, its about time.

 

      

 

Reference:

 

Wachowski, L. & Wachowski, A. (2000). The art of the matrix. New York: New Market

            Press.