Music Monday: A Pirate Looks at Forty

Fitting for someone who just turned 40:

As the philosopher Ferris Bueller said, "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you might miss it."

The veracity of that statement is demonstrated every day. What used to seem like days pass in what feels like hours now. Hours feel like minutes; minutes feel like seconds.

There is an endless march of time as we get older. 

(Okay, so this is me trafficking in cliches and aphorisms. Just be glad I haven't hit the dad joke phase of things yet.)

My larger point is that time ticks away regardless, and there are times when you have to just accept the fact that there usually isn't a "right time" to do something.

Well, that isn't really accurate, though. 

It's easy to push things off to a later time; to try and wait until there is a "right time" that just never seems to come.

There can be a right time, but it usually takes a level of willful planning to make it happen.

Yes, I am a pirate, two hundred years too late
The cannons don't thunder, there's nothing to plunder
I'm an over-fort victim of fate
Arriving too late, arriving too late

The realization that one has hit the 40-50 percent mark of their life (assuming a life expectancy of 80-100 years) makes one do some things differently.

1) I joined a gym a couple of weeks ago and have tried to go at least 4 times a week to work out. Doing a mix of cardio and weight training. After many years of a sedentary lifestyle, I just feel the need to go for about 30-45 minutes a night and get the blood flowing. Hopefully it helps with some weight loss, as I am carrying far more than I need to around my gut...but at the very least, I hope it just helps me feel better in general.

2) I entered a writing contest for the first time. I submitted lyrics I had written about a decade ago to American Songwriter's November/December issue contest. I assume I will find out my status sometime in the fall (October I assume). It's not the kind of thing I've ever done before, but I figure now is as good a time as any to work on this whole writing sideline and get myself out there more.

I don't expect to be able to make a living as a writer, but to make a little money on the side would be nice. I also hope, this year, to finally finish three of the writing projects I have on the table: One novel, one screenplay, and (funnily enough) a collection of the song lyrics I've written.

3) Of course, I don't know how much money I would actually be able to make as a writer, since my time may be limited by another endeavor. I am looking into the possibility of returning to school to get an advanced degree. I would most likely be pursuing the degree online, because I never know what the future fully holds.

This is definitely one of those instances of where the timing is not really right, but the timing is never ever really going to be right. While I don't want to plunge right in, I could be back in school as early as Spring 2019. To be honest, my timeline for school is going to be affected by my writing timeline.

This is ambitious and complicated and messy as I try and juggle all of this with a demanding and complicated full-time job. But sometimes you have to give things a shot and hope that you can make things work. You have to make your own time and take your risk. Failure is always an option, but inertia can't be. Not anymore.

Mother, mother ocean, I have heard you call
Wanted to sail upon your waters since I was three feet tall
You've seen it all, you've seen it all

Watched the men who rode you switch from sails to steam
And in your belly you hold the treasures few have ever seen
Most of them dream, most of them dream