#265. Jump Off A Diving Board

I turned 27 last month.

I'm officially in my late twenties. Three years to thirty, assuming I make it that long (life makes no guarantees). A sort of countdown has begun, in my head. I only have three years now. Three years left to do a lot of things. Three years left to try and live to the fullest this ephemeral period of my life I've defined as my youth. A decade where indiscretions are theoretically excused, a decade of experimentation, a decade where we as people work our way from children to this increasingly distant concept of adults.

This list.

For the next three years I have two decidedly different goals, and I can't tell if they work perfectly at odds with or in conjunction with each other.

The first is to wring every last ounce of youth from these three years that I possibly can. To pack them full of fearless mistakes so tremendous I will have stories for the rest of my life. There is an age limit to the social acceptability to certain activities and behaviors and I have been so locked into certain modes and methods that I wonder if the window is already closed but I want those memories, damn it. Strip poker, and sneaking into pools, jumping off shit, or whatever it is - I want it. I feel like, for all I've accomplished, I've spent years spinning my wheels and wasting time.

I'm tired of it.

Bring on the late nights, early mornings, mistakes, regrets, surprisingly wonderful moments of reflection, loud music, bare skin, long roads, clear skies, kisses, drinks, parties, and photographs.

I want it.

Now the second is to grow the fuck up.

It has become clear to me of late that there is rot in my soul. A basic foundation of certain life skills that is just not there, or where it needs to be. I've kept my head in the sand for too long avoiding the problems, because those gaps are tied to terrible shit like my family, or the Ranch. Shame and pain, baby. Deep shame and deep pain.

Doesn't matter.

It's time to change, because it is now or never.

I do not want to feel like this at 50. Mentally, physically, infra structurally. No credit, overweight, alone, with a dirty car, bitter about theatre, whatever it is.

No. I don't want it.
I can see it happening and I. Don't. Want. It.

So step by step, brick by brick, I am and will take these three years to clean the rot and build myself to the man I have always wanted to be. It is going to be incredibly difficult, and to be honest, I don't truly believe there is an end in sight.

Don't care. Stakes are too high.

By thirty I will look at myself in the mirror and be three years closer to the  man I want to be, whatever that meeans, because I am just not willing to lose another year.

Better living.
Sink or Swim.

So here is a picture of me jumping off a diving board midnight of my 27th birthday.
It's about damn time.