Some Thoughts about Aging and The Passage of Time

and also life, parenting, and lawn maintenance

The three amigos of euphonium. circa 2001.

I had dinner with an old army buddy the other night. That sounds like something someone much older would say, but I suppose I’m becoming much older. After 20+ years, you think we would have drifted apart, but we were both in a tiny fraternity within a tiny fraternity.

We were both US Army Bandsmen. And not only were we in the army band, but we were both euphonium players in the army band. It was an actual recognized military occupational specialty, or MOS. Military bands were one of the only places in the world where one could play that instrument for a living, and the job was one of the most unique combinations of military and musical occupations imaginable.

In what bizarro world do you join the army to play in the band? This one, I guess. Looking back on it, it seems ridiculous. The uniqueness is also one of the reasons the memories of the experience are still so vivid.

Beyond that, I couldn’t get over how weird it was to sit with this person I hadn’t seen in so long. We were best friends for years. We drove to Las Vegas together when I turned 21. We arranged music together, watched the Olympics together, we got drunk together, went bowling, worked out, played concerts, and lived army life. Then, after the army, it was all over. Years went by, and we didn’t speak. It’s the way of military life.

While we did everything together in the army, I’ve lived at least three lifetimes since then. He knew me when I had first left home. When I was learning to be a musician and a fake soldier and an alcoholic. When I was still trying to figure out who I was. He didn’t know me when I met my wife or went back to school or had kids or got sober or became an artist.

But we both seemed to be aware of the multi-faceted nature of the human experience. Like me, he has lived lifetimes since we knew each other. He got married, had two kids, one of whom is now in college. He retired from the army band and became a civilian contractor doing IT work. I didn’t even remember he had that skill set. Still, we found common ground to talk about. We talked about all the people we knew and the new things we enjoyed. We were the same people we used to be, only with added layers of life lived.

As I sat with my old friend, I remembered all the things we did together and wondered how his friendship may have shaped my life. There is a transference of energy and information in shared experiences, and it’s magical. It’s not often you get to sit down with someone you knew when you were someone else.

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I’m hung up on the idea that some people come into your life and stay for a long time, and some only stay for a short time. Some people show up for minutes or hours or days, make a splash, and then disappear like a puff of smoke. Their impact isn’t lessened because of the time involved. It’s all temporary in the end, anyway. What lingers are the ideas and perspectives.

These are the thoughts of an aging dad out mowing the lawn over the same patches of grass where the kids used to crawl.

I mow over the spot where the trampoline used to be. I imagine my kids finagling the sprinkler underneath so they could jump AND get wet, and I can still hear their giggles. In disrepair, I took it down last spring, much to their dismay. We won’t replace it, as they’re too old for one now, but it makes me melancholy. I get the same feeling as I mow around the swingset my dad and I built for them. They don’t use it much anymore, and it will eventually suffer the same fate as the trampoline.

Mowing the same pattern in the same lawn makes me feel old, but I have a hard time changing the pattern. The ruts I’ve made with the wheels of the mower feel ever deeper. I despise the thought of being an area dad mowing the same lawn, grilling the same burgers, having the same conversations until I die. I see my neighbors doing the same shit every weekend and it makes me depressed.

This is the reason I’m not opposed to turning the page on things in my life when they don’t move me forward any longer. I’m happy trying new things and compiling experiences and skills. I don’t understand the point of living if it’s only to do the same things until I die. I suppose the trick is to do those things within and around the confines of a chosen life with whom and where I am.

I’m not going to pick up and move because I’m ready for change. I’m going to open the pool and swim for the 9th summer in the same water that’s been here for all that time. I’m going to enjoy lounging by the pool with her instead of launching my daughter 10’ into the air like I had just a year or two ago. I’m going to enjoy one more summer in the sun for the way things are right now, without worrying about what was or what may be.

Being aware of how much has and will change can be good and bad. It may be 20 years before I see my friend again. Maybe I’ll never see him again. Or, maybe aging brings new opportunities to reconnect with old friends or to make new friends.

Impossible to see, the future is. Humans are good at seeing the change of the past but terrible at imagining the future.

I think I’ll go play with ink and see where it takes me.

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Here we are, only 25 years older. Still kickin’.