Welcome to About Three Decades

 I'm tired and don't have much to say tonight, but here are some thoughts as I process that I've lived on this Earth about three decades...

I love this photo I took in Iceland.

Nothing really changes, but nothing stays the same. I'm a 90s kid who remembers a time before the Internet, yet now I can't imagine a world without my smart phone. My first computer was a Windows 98, though I know I played games on an even older laptop - that first game had Mickey Mouse - in the apartment we lived in before the house.

All of my first cousins have graduated from high school. It seems like it was last summer I was babysitting them for 20 bucks an hour. That was over 5 years ago. I hope babysitters are getting paid better. 

My childhood didn't end in one traumatic or a summer in transition like in "Stand By Me" or "Now and Then". . It was a slow death spiral that started in April 1999. The final knell of the requiem bell was in December 2012, but by 2003 the pessimism had fully set in.

Those last two lines I might use later in a poem.  

Speaking of which, I had a professor tell me I didn't have the heart of a poet. Little did that guy know that this year I'd publish my first chapbook. I'm not stopping at that. Hopefully I'll get a book deal sometime soon. 

I've moved three states, but haven't lived overseas. Unless I count those weeks I spent in Japan as a kid - which I sometimes do. It was six amazing weeks spent with my aunt and uncle. It took me nearly 18 years to visit again. 

I miss the days I spent in school. Then I remember the stress of tests, the anxiety to "fit in", and the unpleasant changes my body went through. I appreciate that those years are long over. 

Three decades seems like a long time, but so did five years when I turned six. Some days I feel too young for the problems that I face and should be ordering kids meals at Fridays. Other days I'm so ancient, I haven't a clue who's the guest host at The Kid's Choice Awards.

Were the 70s really 50 years ago?

My sibling's been married, my friends are having kids and I'm at home binge watching "Naruto" for the nth time. Somehow I ended up with a cat.

Three decades is a weird spot to sit. I'm an adult, but I still am learning like I did as a kid. I pass, I fail, I play in the dirt - it's now called gardening. I'm thinking about buying a home, but I don't want the responsibility. Then again, I somehow ended up responsible for a cat.

When I think about the present, I usually hate it. But the past is always a fairy tale. The harsh edges and rough patches glossed over like one of the photos in my albums. Do people still keep photo albums or is that just me?

So here's to the 2020s, the 2010s were a ride. And here's to the 30s, 40s, and 50s - may the 90s kids excel. Three decades are gone and three more are to come.

Until next week.

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Now how to update my blog summary...?