Youth is Wasted On the Young

The old man sits on the porch watching George Bailey bumble and stumble his way through an attempted pass at Mary.  The old man is annoyed, impatient, and grumpy.  He then utters some of the most famous words ever uttered in a movie, "youth i wasted on the young" before he storms inside his house.

I have always loved this movie, "It's a Wonderful Life," for those of you that have not yet caught up, and I have always liked this line, the only problem is that I now find myself on the other side of it.

Another older but goody, "if I only new then what I know now," but that of course is impossible.  I now have a profound sense for what that old man on the porch was feeling.

As I sit here listening to classical music that I often listened to when I was in college, I realize that it is the things I enjoy, that I have always enjoyed, that which I like to do that has been wasted, and youth is not wasted so much as lost.  When was the last time that I road, or ran, or played for two or three hours every day, six days a week?  Too long is the simple answer.

We go from walking, running, riding everywhere, from when playing games and chasing the latest infatuation is all that matters to trying to do what is right, expected, responsible, and some are quite good at it, some even enjoy it, easier perhaps when that comes with house, family, kids and grandkids, but then again harder at the same time.  I don't really know, but I am sure that I don't have answers.

I am certain of a couple of things, and my "friends" occasionally help with some of these harsh realities, it is true that in some way I thought I had forever, or at least I did live life a bit that way.  It is also true that I may not have taken full advantage of some of the opportunities that were in front of me, but then again, I have had experiences, experiences that I will truly never forget, at least as long as I have a memory, and many of the experiences would fall into the once in a lifetime kind, or at least close to it.

My father has always said, among many things, that I "suffer life," and this too is probably true, but I guess the good side of that is that I have most definitely felt life along the way, sometimes as good as humanly possible and sometimes so bad that I wished I could no longer feel, but I have felt it all.

Thank you again for getting this far with me.