"El sol se levantará mañana y quién sabe lo que traerá la marea"

I aged another year last Thursday.  46 years before at about 0800H my mom brought me into this world via C-section at a private hospital. My father was not there to see and feel the momentous occasion because he was a young Navy Lieutenant and was aboard ship that time.  The world rejoiced on that day.

I do recall when I was a boy, my Grandfather, a retired Army Colonel telling me how my dad was jumping up and down like a cracked up baboon when he saw me first at the nursery a few days later.  I think that meant to be a good thing.  I think.

Fast  forward forty six years.  30 years and a day after “Back to the Future premiered, the year when its sequel “Back to the Future 2” was supposed to have happened, hover boards, auto fitting jackets, Nike’s and all.

As years pass, birthdays become increasingly non-eventful. Quiet.  No more wild parties.  The highlight was a simple dinner with my crew and some coffee after.  Fewer and fewer people remember.  The few though are the ones that matter the most.  That is more than enough.

Almost half a century in and I am still alive.  Been in several fights, accidents, got shot, bungee jumped, got hospitalized, did all the crazy stuff.  So far, here I am still standing upright .  Man, when I was a kid I thought of people in their 30’s as dinosaurs and here I am. A dino myself plus a decade.

Each year, I usually pause and reflect on my birthday.   I review my little  lists - Bucket List, Happiest Moments and Blessings List.  Often, I update.  Mostly I add to the Blessings of which I am always grateful, add more times to the Moments and tick off done items in the Bucket List.  Strangely, though I make some additions, as the years pass the Bucket List does not seem to be all that long anymore.  I still his have to fall in love, sky dive, backpack Europe, date a black woman, become a standup comic, get married among some of the things still left to do listed in there

Also on my birthday, I add an entry to my blog. I also  usually go to a church to pray,   give thanks and ask for guidance.  Everything I have, the people I hold dear, the opportunities, the material stuff – everything was given to me by Him.  To add,  I truly am grateful for each day.  Life is short I realized.  Being dead is much longer.

Gosh.  So much has happened since 1969.

 

Back then, not everyone had a phone.  Smoking was allowed almost everywhere.  The air was cleaner.

These days, people are so connected its annoying at times. Snail mail is almost obsolete.  Same sex marriage is no big thing.  Everything is on Google.  Space tourism may be a reality soon.  Sperry topsiders are chic again.

46 years. I Forrest Gumped it this far, somehow.  I am still here standing.  Many have fallen.  Many that seem to have far more to live for have gone ahead to the great beyond.

Whenever I try to plot my life, I reaffirm that there has to be a God.  For only He can put me at this place at that time to do this, get my education, place me here to do that, to lead to this and so on and so forth in the “space time continuum”.  No rocket scientist can draw a line to plot anyone’s life.  We are all pawns in a cosmic game of chess. 

Daydreaming of going back in time is a habit.  I would love to have made some changes in choices made, lottery tickets I bought and all but that’s about it.  I can just dream about something no one can change anymore,   The future is what we can still shape.  We move forward to do so.

 

In retrospect, my life does have its share vicissitudes.  I look at the good, not forgetting the bad and the lessons that comes with it.  The good, bad, the not so good, the outright bizarre, my life would just be that is a nutshell.  A hodgepodge of all that.

Ces’t la vie.  That’s just the way it goes…..

"Anything can happen.  Anything happens all the time.",  I got that from that movie “This is where I leave you”.  I believe so.  It is all part and parcel of the adventure of life.  That saying made an impact on me not just in a romantic sense but the way I am living my life.    

 

The Spanish say "El sol se levantará mañana y quién sabe lo que traerá la marea" - "The sun will rise tomorrow and who knows what the tide will bring." 

My sentiments exactimondo like Tom Hanks said in Cast Away, “So now I know what I have to do. I have to keep breathing. And tomorrow the sun will rise, and who knows what the tide will bring in.”.

Succinctly put.  I keep breathing.  I push on. God knows what the tide WILL bring to my ocean of life.

Someone also said "Each day is a loan, spend it wisely".  Better get out there and tick more of those Bucket List items, crash those parties, cherish friendships.  We are all paying for that same loan. What if it was the last time for us?

 

Anything happens all the time.  Thank you Lord for all Your blessings.  Life goes on.  The sun WILL rise tomorrow.  The adventure continues.

 Like Forrest, I still run. Happy Birthday to me.