Better Out Than In.

OK. Deep breath. I've concluded that it is entirely possible to love your own children whilst simultaneously disliking being a parent. I can love my wife without always liking being married. I can love my job whilst often wishing I wasn't there. That wasn't nearly as hard to admit to myself as I thought it might be. On kids, irrespective of age it's just hard work and an emotional drain. Mine are aged 16 and 19 respectively and I'm none the wiser as to how things may turn out for them. I often resent the time it takes and the barriers to freedom kids present. They just do. There's a life I want to live that is locked off from me and there are some days it is hard to be patient, or to believe that this will ever change. With marriage, well that's less of a shock because I don't know a single couple that get things right all the time. Balancing the need to build a life with the desire to fulfill dreams is just so hard. On occasion I like the idea of having my own bachelor pad where I can just be precisely who I want to be all of the time. Nobody to answer to, no mood swings and times of the month to contend with. If I sound like I'm being selfish then you'd not be wrong. I'm not trying to defend this perspective, either, but rather just venting because I know I'm not alone in this regard. Beyond that I'm not the easiest person to spend long periods with and I expect Joy has similar feelings more often than she might care to admit. But here's the thing, none of these thoughts make a person guilty of anything. Actions define who we are. Outcomes. We're free to bitch and moan about how the world could be better. I mean, if our own minds aren't a safe space then God help us all. Regarding work, I love being able to make a positive difference, but I'm there an awful lot. Things are better now we're no longer working a shift pattern that left many of us physically and mentally unwell. What a boon that is. I recall regularly doing 5 consecutive night shifts and then I'd have only two days off. Imagine that. What an immoral shit show that was, but the lessons have been learned and I'm now on an infinitely more sustainable 6 on, 4 off pattern. I cannot begin to impress upon you what a positive difference it has made. I haven't had a sick day since it came in. I get time to recover and regroup. The system acknowledges my humanity and physicality and for that I'm grateful. There's probably a bit of a theme to this post. I know much of what I say sounds hard hearted. I've had people say that I voice the things that many secretly think but never articulate. I'm not sure what I feel about that. You have a voice, haven't you? Bloody well use it and risk the consequences. As I splurge all this onto the virtual page I can feel it doing me good. Better out than in, as they say. Unless you're a flasher, in which case the reverse holds true. Sometimes I just need to let it all out and today is that day. And just to assure you; I love my kids, and I adore my wife, whom will forever be far too good for me. But I am a flawed creature. The rough edges and the contradictions are all out in the open. It is what it is. I am who I am. Here endeth the sermon.

So Why Don't They Test Anti Wrinkle Cream On Testicles?

I mean, if they can smooth those puppies out that's got to be a major sell? In other news, turns out next near I'm 50. It sounds a lot older than 49. I'm having a bit of an issue about it. It's not exactly a mid life crisis because that ship sailed years hence. It's just that there's something about this landmark that's really got my knickers in a bunch. But why now? Why at all? We're all on the same conveyor belt towards the Reaper, aren't we? I've been trying to figure it out, and the best I can do is wonder whether it might be something to do with my Dad and his Father dying at 67. Now neither lived healthy lifestyles, with both of them smoking and drinking. I do neither save for an occasional bottle of beer or a pint. Can I draw any inferences from their relatively premature demise? Is that just how long the fuse is on the male side of the family? Oh, and then there's the fact that I'm the last of the male Barnes family line. It concludes with yours truly. I've two daughters, so that's a low level extinction event. In all honesty it probably isn't any one thing that's causing this slightly raised sense of my own mortality. And the truth of it is, If I died tomorrow I'd have nothing to moan about. I have had the most incredible, enriching, thrill ride of a life. I've gone down path's I never imagined I would. Experienced all manner of people and places. There's no unfinished business. In fact quite the contrary. I'm still starving for new experiences. My mind has always been a swirling vortex of activity, sometimes to such an extent that I can run a little too hot. By this I mean I have the propensity to become obsessed about certain things; I feel the tribulations of the world so accutely that sometimes I just can't settle. At these times I have to step back, take my foot off the pedal and just focus on the simple things. Joy tends to notice these phases before I do, and the trouble is that when I'm in top gear my mind is fizzing at a thousands miles an hour. It reels away in all manner of directions as I wrestle with what's going on. But, when all is said and done I try to remind myself that none of us are really in control. We're all trapped on the same pale blue dot travelling at somewhere close to 17,000 miles per hour. Just think about that for a second. As you sit reading this you're travelling through space at an insane speed. We kid ourselves when we think we're really in control of anything. We're all just clinging on. Whether I like it or not next March I hit that milestone. I pass the threshold into a new decade. What will it bring? I hope we can finally find a place in the country. I ache for country life. Really ache. I want to wake up to birdsong and the breeze as the ambient sound rather than the crash of bins or a Police siren. I need the tranquility because in that I find a balance and a peace that I cannot find elsewhere. The natural world becalms me. Sooths my soul. Somehow helps me to register that I'm part of something more. Something astonishing. A dance that's been ongoing for several billion years. And it will continue when I'm gone, this great serenade we refer to as existence. All around us, all the time. In so many ways we're so very small and inconsequential, yet in another sense we're immense. We're part of the great human story, and the human story part of nature's story, and nature's story part of Earth's story, and Earth's story part of a Universe so vast and ancient that it defies all contemplation. When I think about things like that, turning 50 doesn't seem so bad.