I think Pink Floyd said it best:
Ticking away the moments that make up the dull day
You fritter and waste the hours in an off hand way

Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town

Waiting for someone or something to show you the way

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain

You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today

And then one day you find that ten years have got behind you

No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And you run and run to catch up with the sun, but it's sinking

And racing around to come up behind you again

The sun is the same in a relative way, but you're older

Shorter of breath and one day closer to death

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time

Plans that either come to naught or a half page of scribbled lines

Hanging on in a quiet desperation is the English way

The time is gone the song is over, thought i'd something more to say

Thanks for depressing me!

Buy a Jeep, you'll feel better.

I'm turning 30 in 8 months. I know exactly how you're feeling. Married, 2 kids, my best friend just got married a few months ago. I missed my 10 year high school reunion last year, and man do I regret that.
Keep up the good work Wil.

I miss my childhood, too. I remember when I couldn't wait to be an adult, and now I wish I had just taken the time to enjoy being a kid. I turned 30 last month, and I didn't have a problem with it, until the other day. I was training for a new job, and this pipsqueak 20 yr. old said that he wanted to train with me beacause I'm OLD! I never thought I looked old, but now I keep looking in the mirror to see if I really do. My husband thinks that's funny. Damn younguns!

You just quoted the way I felt last night, word for word. And I'm only 23. But having a mortgage to pay and not being able to find employment in this screwed up economy... well, it gets to you. My only regret is that I wish I were an actor. That way, when I act really strange and melodramatic and "out of tune" with mainstream society, people could nod their heads knowingly and say, "Pshht, actors."

Actually, I don't believe I've ever heard anyone say "pshht" before.

GSL

I believe the comment is:
Youth is wasted on the young......

Hey Wil,

Here's my take on 30: approaching 30 is far far worse than being 30. Have the party, whoop it up. But when you actually become 30, it's a relief. The excitement of approaching your 30s outweighs lamenting your 20s because you finally realize, 30 is still goddamn young.

So don't sweat it. Remind me of this as I approach 40.

GURPS?

I'm 33 and my childhood ain't over! The new Star Wars toys go on sale tonight and I can't wait! You going?

Don't be sad. This is normal. Usually between the ages of 30 and 35 or so, people suddenly have this self-evaluation hit them. You look back at your life, and have to think: gosh, that part is over. Why didn't I appreciate it more? Why did I have to make those mistakes? What do I do now?

This is a bittersweet experience, but an important one, similar to the Alcoholics Anonymous "searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves." It's difficult, and it's hard, but you know, at the end of the day, whether you're 30 or 40 or 50, you are still yourself albeit with a bit more experience.

Cherish this time, and these memories, and this chance to embrace the past as well as the future.

And .. yeah, that kinda stuff. :-)

I know what you're saying. I have a 10 month old son and I turn 30 on April 29th. I've been married for almost 7 years! (in June) I'm feeling my age but I'm loving being a parent and wife.

(My previous post was brought to you by my Mom. Just so you know.)

*Sighs* You made ME feel nostalgic.

I've only just turned 17!!! *Gets worried*

But yeah, that was really sad man!! But you've still got loads of life ahead of you, and you can relive your teenage years through the kids :0)

Wow, turning 23 on Friday doesn't seem so bad now . . . thanks man!

*Realises something*

Gosh darnit, if you're nearly 30 then I'm gonna have to forget my childhood/teen crush and fantasies!!!

Grrrr ;0)

1 year, 274 days, 9 hours and some minutes before 30, I begin to realize that life is all too swift in it's movements, all too damn fast. Too many memories flood my thoughts, as I sit at my desk, wondering what bill will be in the mailbox today, as I crawl in rush hour traffic toward home.

Wil is right. I miss those days of jumping over the local golf course's fences and heading down to the creek that ran down it's middle. To find friends, adventure and just waste some time way, playing, fooling around and not even realize your just a little closer to the end of the ride.

But, I look forward to the first cry of my first child. The first ball to be thrown by him or her, before little league tryouts. The first school dance for them.

Life is moments. Whether lived, or remembered, it all becomes a part of the whole of our lives.

Here's to life, and the hope that tomorrow will come...

Philosophizing in Philly,

Leo

For those who don't know find out about GURPS here: http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/

You know I would say take heart, but I think inside all of this is a sweet joy welling up that you will only realize once you have passed the milestone and moved onward. It's like the first time you did anything - an Ollie, first century bike ride, first 10K run - the anticipation brings up more than you can possibly explain. The realization leaves you wondering what you were so worried about. That we all go through it is no salve for what you are feeling right now and that you will ultimately rejoice in moving forward is probably of no help either. Youth is not wasted on the young it is lavished on us in the only time when we can truly marvel and form into who we will be.

Peace be with you.

once again Uncle Willy voices a nerve hitting mood. i'm but a wee lad of 25 and have been going through that same 'life evaluation'. thankfully i don't have the kids or the mortgage, but to look back and pinpoint the lost opportunities, friends i've lost touch with and people i've truely underappreciated...is a long list.
and yes, i know what GURPS is. i was in the wargaming rather than RPG crowd though.

one more year, turning away
meaning nothing; but night into day
lost and faded, never to be seen
i'll meet you again in my next drunken dream

colder, gets colder: and i realise i'm older
touch my heart like you never did before
seems wrong - im still living, that i should be
so unwilling
and i know i should be giving you more

who would've thought? i'll admit, i did hope
my unnatural breathing, our failure to cope
i've seen strangers before me - who stumble and fall
there goes another year
makes no difference at all

Wil,

You're bringing me down. Down like a sledge hammer.

And you didn't cross EVERY bridge with Darin! I mean, all I saw was you, Feldman, River, and the fat kid on that bridge! No Darin! What's the story there?!

Wil,
Don't worry about it...turning 30 isn't anything. Yeah, you have the mortgage and other bills, but the really GOOD part is your lovely wife and those great kids! :o )
I'm also a very nostalgic and sentimental person. I tend to want things that were in my childhood to never change, and when I go back to see if they have, then I'm disappointed when I see that they really did change. But, that's life and just how things go. All you can do is cherish what you have, what you DID have in the past and hope great things for the future.
Enjoying the website..keep up the great work!

Take care,

I know just how you feel Will. I'm going to be 40 in 3 months, and I have many of the same feelings. What is it about these milestone birthdays that make us all weepy and sentimental!

Hey Wil....

Ive had several urges to write in the past but nothing moved my hand as much as this. I turned 30 March 1st and in the time up to that, and since, Ive often found myself thinking the same thoughts. At any rate, you're not alone, dig?

On a less somber note, and since Im posting anyway, Your "Im a cowboy, howdy , howdy, howdy." headline cracked me up a few months ago. Great Far Side ref. Sorry to go off topic.....

little

Yeah, I used to have this childhood, then this woman came and put me in a ginger bread cake cage where I hunted deer and tried not to contract syphillis. God bless wee willy wheaton and all that sail in/on/in him/her.
peace will.

Call me the Queen of Nostalgia. You just can't avoid it when you've live the last 19 years of your life in the same medium-sized town. From 8 to 27 I've lived in the same place. Learned to drive here, fell in love (and had my heart broken) for the first time here, buried my first pet here, lost my virginity here, experienced all the violent peaks and valleys of adolecence here.

But one thing I've learned is that the more you look back the greater your chance for taking a wrong turn on the road ahead.

I, for one, am looking forward to my 30's. Damn, Wil, think about it. All of the awkward insecurities of your teens and tumultuous instabilities of your twenties are behind you! You are more stable, more settled, more comfortable than circumstances of life have allowed before.

I have loved my twenties. In retrospect, I also loved my teens. But just because what lies ahead is different than what came before, it shouldn't make you sad. Rather, be grateful that you've made it this far on the path to see another phase of life.

Live what you are, not what you were. Life is one great trip.

Yeah but on the plus side you look like you're about 23.

And you don't have to worry about your parents catching you mastrubating.

I hear ya Wil. I'm not THAT old, only 27, but my 1 year High School Reunion is in a few months.

Makes me think of HIgh School. 10 years ago, and what life was like.

But, I would never go back. I wouldn't trade all the personal growth and insight for freedom from responsibility.

But, how about just a week of it? ;)

Hi Will,

That's so funny. My friend and I were just chatting about this very topic this morning. I'm 25 and lately the fact that I will be turning 30 in 4 1/2 years has been on my mind.

Last month one of my close friends celebrated her 26th birthday and I told her, "Wow, four more years and you'll be 30." She glared at me and said, "I hadn't even thought of that, gee thanks." Immediately, I felt really bad that those words had slipped out of my mouth.

I also reminsince about my childhood frequenctly. My life now is pretty good even though like many my age, I'm boggled down with student loans, rent, bills, etc. But, I think about where I envisioned myself to be at this age when I was 10, 13, and 18 and I feel a little disappointed. However, when we are that young, I think that we are naively optimistic. Like you said, at that age we don't know the realities of life as an adult.

Anywhoo - I appreciated this post. It's always nice and comforting to know that others feel the same way. I also, have been seeing those I know getting married, having kids, etc and it's both happy and disturbing at the same time. Maybe this sounds silly coming from someone that's 25 and not as close to pushing 30, but it's how I feel. Thanks...

-V

You sound like Richard Dryfues grieving over the loss of his youth with a typewriter:) Sorry, I couldn't help but notice the similarity. Everybody gets hit with a flood of nostalgia at sometime(s) in their life, it can be depressing and joyful. I try hard to just appreciate the fact that I got to live my childhood once, some kids get robbed of their youth entirely, that's truly sad.

I'll be hitting 30 in September; I don't know about you, but I plan on leaving my 20's with a bang!

Wow, I had a similiar experience yesterday, except (geekily enough) from a set of dice I found. It was the same set of dice we used to play our pen and paper games with when I was just 14 and there they were again still being used by other people for D'N'D. Realizing that you've now known someone (the owner of the dice) for more than half your life is kind of a scary thing. I think (as others have already mentioned) that those of us around 30 all have these kinds of feelings. I think it's ok to feel nostalgic, just don't get lost in it.

Hi! I just wanted to say that I am probably the only person having more fun at 32, than I ever did as a teenager. I was a model when I was 15-18, so a lot of the fun "geeky" stuff that I really should have been enjoying was missed out on. My hubby and I STILL play RPG's (not GURPS, but White Wolf), we have Classic 80's Arcade Games in our gameroom, a slushie machine, and have marathon weekends of online gaming. The best part is being able to afford the toys you couldn't have as a kid. So enjoy the nostalgia, but remember, 30 is not bad, if you still remember how to be a kid! :)

I know exactly how you feel. I went back to school and am finishin up college at 26 and sheesh, these kids are all so young...

My solution is to latch on to the things I love and don't look back. I still play GURPS, and D&D, and read sci-fi and pine over geek girls who see me as a friend. It's like a dual life -- I'm the 'adult type', but I'm also the kid, I guess...that's what you have to do. Remember that you can have fun, even when life tries to convince you you can't.

And from what you've said, Wil, you do that all the time.

If you want, you can sit at my table anytime...real or online.

--Matt

30 is the age at which you start realizing that you will have to grow up sometime. 40 is the age at which you realize that you will eventually have to decide what you want to be when you grow up.

50, now -- it kind of hits you that you really are an adult - no way out of it! You're also (ugh!) middle-aged. But the good thing is that you're who you're going to be and are comfortable with it. Life gets easier as you get older.

Look forward to the days that come while you cherish the days past. They are a part of you and make you what you are.

30 is the age at which you start realizing that you will have to grow up sometime. 40 is the age at which you realize that you will eventually have to decide what you want to be when you grow up.

50, now -- it kind of hits you that you really are an adult - no way out of it! You're also (ugh!) middle-aged. But the good thing is that you're who you're going to be and are comfortable with it. Life gets easier as you get older.

Look forward to the days that come while you cherish the days past. They are a part of you and make you what you are.

30 is the age at which you start realizing that you will have to grow up sometime. 40 is the age at which you realize that you will eventually have to decide what you want to be when you grow up.

50, now -- it kind of hits you that you really are an adult - no way out of it! You're also (ugh!) middle-aged. But the good thing is that you're who you're going to be and are comfortable with it. Life gets easier as you get older.

Look forward to the days that come while you cherish the days past. They are a part of you and make you what you are.

OMG, I will be 30 in 4 months, I have 3 kids, been married for what seems like forever and both of us, last night, finally, consciously have decided to grow up and stop worrying about what EVERYONE will think of us. We are going to live for us, and as an example of what we want our kids to turn out like.

We had this cool conversation with our son in the car the other day, we asked him who's job was more important, the doctor or the garbage man. We told him both, if we didn't have either we would be in a heap of it. We went on to tell him that the reason he needed to study is so he can *choose* to be anything he wanted, not have his job choose him. So if our son chooses to be a doctor, computer programmer or icecream taster, or even a garbage man, we hope he won't look back on his life when he is nearly 30, like us, and regret all the doors that we closed because of our haste to be what we thought our families needed us to be.

Wow Wil!

You're describing what many of us 20-somethings are feeling as well. I'm just a few years younger than you, but I'm hitting that mid-20s crisis syndrome. My friend, who just turned 30 in Feb., went through what you're feeling now. (Although the event that struck him was the fact that Matthew Broderick, aka Ferris Bueller, is 40 now.)

Heck, I dwell on the 80s and early 90s every now and then...but then you gotta think: there's a lot to look forward to, as well. And you'll always have friends and family to help you every step of the way :)

And if all else fails, watch 'the Simpsons' every weeknight (and on Sundays). Viewers still love to watch it 'cause these people never age??? (Geesh, Bart would be my age if he actually aged!)

Oh yeah, there's always Depeche Mode,too! 22 years in the business...and still at it! (And these guys went through hell in their 30s, but got through it--if they can do it, so can a bunch of us 20-somethings dreading the big three-o.

once again I'm impressed at the depth of your writing, and the ability to express what all of us, more or less, are feeling these days.

My best friend from middle and high school is getting divorced. Bloody divorced, man. Divorce is something that happens to older people, to adults, who can handle the pressure, who wimp out and take the easy way out.... or at least, that's what it used to be. Now it's a fact of life, and when I think of how close I have come to that too, it's scary. Mortgage, job, baby, BABY, me for crying out loud with a daughter who is just barely walking and throwing food on the ground when she eats.
gee whiz. thanks for the post, Wil.

I found turning 31 to a bigger deal than turning 30. I suppose it just drove home that I was now firmly on my way to middle age. Strangely, the thought of turning 32 this year isn't a big deal at all.

Dude, I know exactly how you feel. I've been dealing with the same kind of thing. Well, except different. I'm turning 28 this year. Got my high school reunion notice. I have none of the things you have and that's depressed me. I'm not married, no kids, no house (I rent an apartment) - none of that. Getting older sucks. It really does. Things you talked about missing, I do too. Is it me, or do those things seem like a completely different lifetime?

Dude, be thankful that you have friends from back then you can still count as friends and not as people you have grown away from. That makes times like this even more difficult. I'm 32, and I am very far from any of my family and friends, or the people I grew up around. I've been through the "quarter life crisis", as have many of my former acquaintances. This was also exacerbated by my divorce, which was bad. I dealt with it all by remembering who I was, by getting in touch with the crazy sonofabitch that used to run through the streets protesting war, greed, and pretty much the powers that be. I forgot who I was and became a shell of myself, all just to be a "productive member of society" so I could support my family. Now I exist not as a drone that exists to work, but as a vital human being that thrives in spite of society. That helped me, but I'm afraid that for someone who is happy with where their life has ended up you'll just have to face the fact that all things change and that we can let them change us, resist change to the point of stagnation, or find a way to positively affect the changes in our world. Easier said than done, but it is worth trying. Remember this: your youth was not wasted if you learned from every stupid mistake and every glorious victory. Reflect on it, but don't spend too much time there, because let's face it, we were all idiots when we were kids. I don't want to be 17 again. I appreciate the freedoms of being an adult, even with the responsibilities. One final thought: your body ages, but that doesn't mean your mind has to grow old. Besides, they're doing some great stuff with cloning and genetics, so if we're lucky we can be "young" forever. :)

I totally understand where you are coming from. I recently went to a friends house on the street I grew up and we got bored so we decided to take a walk. Worst mistake ever. We began walking and all of my childhood memories came rushing back to me and I felt so lost. The same street where I knew we would make ruts in the pavement walking to and from eachothers homes was now unfamiliar territory. The times when you planned how your life would be and now looking and realizing that you have not acheieved all that you had wanted to by this age. I can say that my age has taught me many things but I would give anything to be a kid again just for a day. Remember the movie "Big" The would be the ultimate wish. And just as he did Im sure that we would miss our lives the way the are now even though childhood was a blast.

Before I start, Happy birthday for Friday Amanda.

I have two quotes which I believe, should cheer any 30 (or near as dammit to 30)-somethings:

I quote from the excellent movie "Caddyshack"

Allthough you may grin, when your ship comes in and you've got the stock market beat, but remember;
That the man worthwhile is the man who can smile, when his shorts are too tight in the seat!

I quote my best friend Krissy:

We may grow older, but we BLATANTLY refuse to grow up!

I hope that cheers folk up.

*hugs* As painful as the nostalgia can be, it's nice to go back to the "carefree" days of childhood. Just use it as a lesson to appreciate everyday of your life. I think it's the things we see happening around us that make us feel old. I'm 22 and most of my high school friends are married with children now. I look at it and think how old I feel, but then I realize... I'm still young. And I still will be when I'm 80. Getting older is a requirement in life... grow up is not.

I just turned 30 in December. I'm married (one year in a couple of weeks, woohoo!) with a mortgage, three year-old son and another baby on the way. It seems only natural to start looking back. I don't think you really have the perspective to start thinking about the past until you're around this age.

The thing that I miss the most is my early-mid 20's when I was single and living in Manhattan. Everything seemed so full of possibilities. I think back on the choices I've made and wonder if things had been different if I had taken more risks. It's amazing how you make some choices that end up having a major affect on the course that your life is taking, but you don't realize it at the time.

At first, this can be very depressing, but then you start thinking about the things that you can change and take joy in, like the growth and education (I'm talking about life education, not just schooling) of your own kids. I think somebody else's post about being a doctor or a garbage man was great. It's the worst thing in the world to feel like your options are limited because of the views of your parents or others that have influence on you. I'm making a point not to be that way with my kids.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that you're not the only one feeling this way. It's great to look back and miss those things. I think it's something you don't want to ever lose. It's also great to look at how you can use those experiences to change the lives of others, especially the ones on whom you have the most direct influence.

Rock on.

I just rounded the 30 corner a month and a half ago and this new local station e105 which plays a lot of "80's music" has certainly struck my nostalgia chord.

I go to bed around 10:30 or 11 every night now instead of the 4am times after playing some role playing and cheesing for a night.

I have a beautiful baby daughter who I wouldn't trade the world for; but me, a father?

I remember drinking beer -- and lots of it -- almost every Friday night while seeing some great live local music. I now feel drunk if I crack a cold one open once every couple of months.

I remember being 15 and watching this new series on TV called Star Trek: The Next Generation and feeling pretty good that there was someone my age represented on TV that gave intelligent teenagers a good name.

Well, that one didn't last long. The writers made it embarrassing for someone my age to suggest to an authority figure that any problem could be solved by soldering a VISOR to an android's positronic net and cross fading the output through the pattern buffers. Shit. That must have been when I aged.

30 isn't so bad. I have the best 'Net access I have EVER had in my life..

-J

wil:

i've been hanging around your website for several months now. this is the first time i've been moved to find the courage to post a comment.

i'm approaching 30 myself this year and, like many of your readers have already expressed, it's an overwhelming feeling. i've found myself wistfully looking back on my younger days much more often lately. wondering where the time has flown and marveling at how far i've come in those tumultuous years.

i, too have been caught up in those emotional whirlwinds - where you're suddenly and inexplicably overcome by so many feelings, and you find yourself silently weeping and smiling at the same time. breathtaken by the strength of the memory and left wondering where that "you" has gone and what's become of that life....

then, i reflect on all that i have accomplished since then. who i've become, and the blessings i've been given. it's all part of the journey. i'm not happy about turning 30. but, i'm convincing myself that, like everything in life - you get out of it what you put into it. i think i'll make it a new beginning.

hope you'll find the same.

So I hate to sound like I'm plugging something, but...
As I'm sure some of you know, there is a movie entitled "Free Enterprise." It is perhaps one of the most entertaining movies I've ever seen. More importantly, it is completely about geeks growing up, and hitting the big 30. Now admittedly it's a comedy, but I found it entertaining and comforting to see others going through the same nostlgia with their friends that I do with mine.

Anyway, I highly recomend it for a week night rental.

Jer

I'm turning 20 in August and I wish I could go back to highschool. :( Well I assume life gets better.

That has got to suck. Nostalgia seems to have biten alot of people recently. Myself included. I've been thinking about the eighties and ninties
for past month. It gets weirder the more I think about it. People I watched growing up, are now grown up. Kids that I saw, are now teens. The houses I used to live in, are freakishly still the same. A stupid Richard Gere movie, is still just as stupid and horrible. I'm kind of glad that I've grown up. Kids today, have to put up with more crap than I did when I was young.And their more weary than I was when I was their age.
Remember, when you turn 30, you better do it right. Major party. That's the only way to start another year.

I love you so much honey...but Damn you could make a movie from that!!! I thought my head was f**ked!!!

I am 23 in 2 months and feel like my life is over so...i know what its like to be overcome with emotion at the things that remind you of the good/bad times!

it kinda reminded me of all those "the way it was movies" you could write a movie of your life and you're ONLY 29....

Don't dispair it would be worse for us if we could go back....

Love,light and peace

Andrea

I may only be 23, but damn can I relate to what you're saying. I went through this exact stage last summer... I bought the old Sweet Valley High books (ok, I'm sure you don't remember SVH since they were chick books, but you dig) and I sat at the computer downloading the credits to old 80's cartoons like Inspector Gadget and the Getalong Gang. Remember those??

Ahh... I get teary eyed just thinking about it.

Glad to know I'm not alone.

once again I'm impressed at the depth of your writing, and the ability to express what all of us, more or less, are feeling these days.

My best friend from middle and high school is getting divorced. Bloody divorced, man. Divorce is something that happens to older people, to adults, who can handle the pressure, who wimp out and take the easy way out.... or at least, that's what it used to be. Now it's a fact of life, and when I think of how close I have come to that too, it's scary. Mortgage, job, baby, BABY, me for crying out loud with a daughter who is just barely walking and throwing food on the ground when she eats.
gee whiz. thanks for the post, Wil.

Hey, Wil,

I'll be 45 in July.

I married my wife when I was 39. (I had never been married, or engaged, before.)

We have 5-year-old and 2-year-old sons, and sometime in the next 3 weeks, we'll have a newborn son.

I'm tired all the time and I worry about money a lot. Mortgage, bills, Catholic school this coming fall...

We're closing on the refinancing of our house tomorrow, for God's sake.

I've bought maybe one CD in the last year.

I haven't had a drink of alcohol since January of 1987.

Fortunately, my family is what really matters to me. I don't want to be as responsible as I am, but I choose to do the best I can for my kids and my wife, at least most of the time.

I take my hat off to you, 29 years old with a wife and two stepsons, one of them almost a teenager! There's no way in hell I could have done what you're doing at your age, as far as relationships and family are concerned. Particularly when it comes to bullshit-pulling ex-husbands.

I know you're happy with your life, and I hope you're also very proud of yourself and your accomplishments.

Have a great day.

I hear ya. I get the same feelings. But I ask myself why I'd want to turn back the clock...things are good now, really good. Back then, I had no money, no idea how I'd get by in the world once I was "all growed up." But I also didn't care. We were old enough to make our own choices but young enough that consequences weren't a concern...a short-lived combination (which is probably for the better).

Heh heh.

I'm 35.

Celibacy, getting winded lifting the remote, minivan, living in your fucking backyard pulling dandelions every goddamned day.

You get used to living without hope.

Without a future.

You will too, Uncle Willie.

Soon...

Oh.

Say, within six months after turning 30, all remnants of your previous life will have been crushed out never to be reignited again.

Then...

You spend the next fifty years planning on who's gonna get your shit when you die.

But check it out...

Spudnuts has an ACE-IN-THE-HOLE.

My ace?

I got me a full head of hair.

Oh yeah.

No, this isn't just a nice sort of cover-job to stave off MPB. This is a motherfucking kudzu-heap of insurance on top of my dome which...

Will.

Not.

Yield.

To the ravages of Big Daddy Entropy.

Fucker.

This head of hair makes my barber weep with envy. Sometimes I have to keep my eye on him to make sure he doesn't stab me in the back of my head and STEAL MY HAIR.

AND my brain.

Which is pretty good too.

So.

Yeah, I'm old.

Yeah, I got the family thing to crush my mortal soul.

Yep.

But...

I got that hair, fucker.

Oops.

Forgot the T in my name.

See?

Pretty damned soon I won't even know where I live. I'll be crrapping in my hand and trying to use it as currency to buy a copy of Newsweek at the Circle K.

But even as I am attempting to exchange my own feces for a completely different heap of feces...

I'll have my hair.

Suck on THAT, Michael Eisner, you BITCH!

you forgot the thought for the day

Suggested:
"If you could toss your troubles in a circle with everyone else, and you had to pull out ANY one of the troubles you found there, you would certainly take back your own."

Oh man, do I know how you feel. I was moving some of my things out of my parents basement this weekend, when I found all of these boxes full of old School stuff. Why in the world I kept Algebra homework from 8th grade is beyond me.

Another box had stacks of those teen magazines from the 80's. I had a little side business going in Middle School trading posters with other girls. And wouldn't you know that our Wil was in a lot of those magazines. Yeah, I too, had a mild crush. How emberrassing it is to try and explain that away to my husband now.

Well, anyway, Wil thanks for the memories.

Just think about it wil, turning 30 is not as bad as turning 40. Your not 30 yet either and it's not that old man! my mom stresses about being 50, you're in your prime!!!!
And as for Ryan, tell him from a person with 3 years experience at being a teenager; yeah it's bad and it sucks sometimes but just smile and be as happy as possible. Don't take your parents for granted either, they always ove you no matter what.
Be happy Wil, a guy as talented and cool as you has got to have a life span of at least 100, you're not even half way through yet!
There's my philosophy for today, sorry it took so much room...just get carried away!
Luv Sal

Oh.

And one other thing...

Youth SUCKED.

Now...

I got me some sweet tech toys, can hop a plane any goddamned time I feel like it to... you know... eat chalupas at Disneyland, bitch, and catch a Lakers game, buy some spudnuts.

Fuck the 80's.

Fucking whoppers and Stove Top Stuffing. Jesus Christ. I can get me some kimchee and tasty Indian foodstuffs whose names I cannot pronounce or watch some cool DVDs on my iBook while shitting, consume premium espresso beverages.

Motherfucker!

I can talk to Wesley Crusher from my goddamned toilet!

And, fella, Ronald Reagan was worse than Dubya.

Fuck nostalgia.

What?

You'd trade eating cucumber sammiches with Dan Quayle for playing hot blues harmonica post-dodgeball with Tiffany?

Shit.

Get your fucking priorities straight.

Imo go get me some spicy tuna roll.

Gotta say I envy Spudnuts his full head of hair.

It's probably not gray, either, is it?

Since I was not really alive whilst you were a real youngster, seeing that I am almost the big 23, you must put this in focus. You do not remember everything that happened in the days of yore. For Christ sake, one of my roommates is 30 and he used to have a mullet, and he listened to Dokken. The 80’s were hell man! Sure there are a few things I miss, all day “Lost In Space” marathons, freeze tag, red bat baseball, but the sun will rise another day. And as an adult, well, kind of, you can do all the things you never could, like buy BB guns, swords, Transformers the Movie, pr0n, all the Legos you want, and best of all, you can appreciate all that free stuff your parents gave you, and you never said “thanks” unless they told you to. Also, you can hold hands with the one you love in public without getting cooties. No regrets.

I know how you feel, Wil. The irony is that we spend the first 18 or so years of our lives running like hell to get away from home, and the rest of our lives trying to get back there. (I don't mean go back and live with our parents... I mean the don't have many worries compared to now, didn't have to pay the bills, was covered by someone else's insurance, always had someone to turn to whenever I needed it comfort of childhood.)
The best way to deal with it?
Roll over and give your wife a hug. Celebrate your birthday with your kid's birthday. Remember that if you got to go back to that age, you'd have to go back to that level of stupidity and ignorance as well( Let's face it, compared to ourselves now, we were IDIOTS. If you AREN'T smarter than you were ten/fifteen/whatever years ago, then bury yourself, 'cause you're dead, you just haven't fallen down yet).

I wonder what could of been of my life if I had taken another road.

Dude, lighten the fark up! would you really want to do 17 all over again? Turning 30 was great, you're comfortable in your own skin & with who you are, you've got more confidence, less concerned with what everyone else thinks-you're your own person, and the sex is pretty great too.
I'll be 38 in 26 days, holy crap! 40 is just around the corner.
Who gives a shit-it's all a state of mind, truely-life just keeps getting better-even with the mortgage, braces, teenagers.......have a couple cocktails and celebrate where you are now compared to where & who you were then-now is better, definitely.
sharfa

I've been there so many times before. Maturity is the salve that soothes the pain of lost youth. Embrace your increase in years gracefully. It really isn't all that bad. Once you get to my age you can start to backslide into your second childhood.......I know how it's done and it's fun! Just think all of the fun of a teenager and all that experience!

Oh god, Wil. I just celebrated my 35th birthday on April 9th. I was so irritable!! and every time the ffing phone rang with well-wishers I wanted to scream. Birthdays should not be like this. Cheer up, thirty wasn't that bad! It's the "35? OH MY GOD I ONLY HAVE 5 YEARS LEFT IN THE 30s" scare that really gets you. And might I add that you are aging well, you don't look thirty so rock on!! :-D

I turn 29 in September. I've been married for 8 years this July and have 2 kids and a mortgage. My 10 yr reunion is this October. I've often found myself reminiscing over my lost youth. But ya know, I wouldn't trade what I have now for anything. I don't foresee 30 as being a huge deal to me, because I'm comfortable with my life, past AND present.

In turning 30, one thing is giving up, a little, the sweet, sunny, exuberant feeling of being a young and new, running into the wind. Thinking of all the unseen places and things to experience. The song "Yesterday, by Roy Clark" reminds me of the color and feeling of those times.
"Yesterday when I was young the taste of life was sweet as rain upon my tongue. I teased at life as if it were a foolish game. The way the evening breeze may tease a candle flame.

A thousand dreams I dreamed the splendid things I planned, I always built to last on weak and shifting sand. I lived by night and shunned the naked light of day. And only now I see how the years ran away.

"Yesterday when I was young, so many happy songs were waiting to be sung. So many wild pleasures lay in store for me, and so much pain my dazzled yes refused to see.
I rans so fast that time and youth at last ran out. I never stoped to think what life was all about, and every conversation I can now recall concerns itself with me and nothing else at all.

Yesterday the moon was blue, and every crazy day broguth something new to do. I Used my magic age as if it were a wand, and never saw the waste and emptiness beyond. The game of love I played with arrogance and pride, and every flame I lit too quickly quickly died...

I think it's good to be able to feel deeply the feelings of life, the changing seasons of time. And to know we can keep some things about being young if we really really want to.

My 16th birthday was last friday so I have been thinking about when I was youger a lot too. I am 16 now, 16! Thats 2 years away from 18! Then in two more years I will be 20! Its really scary to think about.

Wow. All I can say is....wow.

And bummer.

Uncle Willy you seem to be going thru a mid life
crisis a bit early...but eh, what a long strange
trip its been...so you are entitled, I'm sure.

It will be okay. Breathe.

Wow. It's so nice to know I'm not the only one who thinks about such things - the past, how did I get here, where has the time gone, bittersweet memories. I still wonder, perhaps more than I should, what ever happened to friends I used to have, people I used to know.

When I read the part about closing your eyes and visualizing your old room, I stopped and did the same. Amazing, I can still hear the Paula Abdul. I'm not exactly old (24), but I like being older. As a teenager I was always frustrated because society today seems to dismiss teenagers. Everything is a "phase".. Being told my choice of career was a "phase" was on of the most frustrating things about being a teen. I'm lucky, I knew what I wanted to do when I was 15, and I'm still doing it. But man oh man did the kids mock me and my parents try to discourage me.

That feels like yesterday as much as it feels like a lifetime ago. I think no matter how old you are, as long as you're learning and growing and aware of who you've been, you'll always come out on top eventually.

-CarolP

Wil, the funny thing is, I bet most people think of you as "that kid from Star Trek." Unlike a lot of child celebrities, you've made something of yourself since then- you have a loving family, you seem pretty successful in the projects you take on, and of course, you have all of us!

I totally understand what you're going through (I've been thinking the same way for a long time now), but hell, being our age is pretty damn good too. As long as you live every day as if it's the most important, that's what counts.

I just watched that "Inner Light" episode of TNG, so sue me. ;)

I just turned 29 three days ago, I know what you mean by "hyper-nostalgia". By the way, I have to listen to "The 'Burbs" by Jerry Goldsmith to recall my memories. Well...

You write so well.

A song comes to mind: "There are places I remember, all my life, though some have changed."

I can't believe I'm right at that age when I can experience "hyper-nostalgia". Just two days ago, I was thinking about the same things. The mark of crayon on the tile of my childhood bedroom from when a loud clap of thunder made me jump when I was coloring. Or the iron bed frame on the top bunk of the bed my sister slept in that I would hit my head on every morning. My best friend who would rush to my house every after noon to watch Saturday Morning Cartoons because she didn't have a TV. man I'm getting misty eyed.

Just remember what I always remember, Wil - "I may have to get old, but you can't make me do it with dignity".

Wil,
I'm turning 32 in May. I feel every ounce of loss you are. I still am! But let me tell you what did an old man good.
Pass on to your kids all the crazy stupid stuff you did, take them on a tour of your old stomping gounds. Don't hold anything back for fear of warping their tender little minds. Yhey'll ask you stuff that'll just make the memories more vivid, and thus letting your children see that dad's not just a big grumpy bossy guy that was never a kid.
Don't know why but it seemed to make things "better." Like a big sigh that says 'It's cool'

Spudnuts shoots! He scores! The crowd goes wild!

Thank God for hair, that's all I have to say.

Discovered your site on FARK (where else?). Been reading it everyday now for a month or so. I'm only 18, but once in a while something reminds me of how things used to be only.. 9-10 years ago and ask myself why the hell I didn't appreciate it more. That's just the thing, when you ARE that young you're just TOO young to appreciate it. So when you look back, older and hopefully wiser, you have something to contrast to. "Those were the days.. but now is THE day" kinda.. ish. May just be talking outta my ass, but I hear you loud 'n' clear. Keep up the writing, you're my hero man.

I'm right there with you, Wil. And I thought I was the only one feeling these overwhelming senses of longing for the way things used to be.

What really f's me up are the random triggers... Counting change at the laundromat and remembering my first day of work at Burger King when I was 14; breathing the early morning air and reminiscing about the 8 summers I worked at a summer camp in the Boundary Waters of Minnesota; the scent of Obsession and my first kiss in junior high... Ah, good times...

Okay, now I'm depressed again. Smurf off, Wil!

I'm 25 going on 26 in just a few weeks. I've been feeling *really* nostalgic lately. I found a box of things in my basement a few weeks ago. Just some old stuff of mine that I just can't seem to bring myself to throw away. An old "Darth Vader" keychain, a very worn cassette of "Good for your Soul" (Oingo Boingo), a copy of a really bad demo tape that I once did with my best friend in High School (which is really all I have left of him, as we had a serious falling out and haven't talked in nearly 4 years now..), a drawing of a dragon that I did years ago, while sitting in the car, in an old cemetary, with the first girl I ever fell in love with.., my first d20 and a couple worn character sheets, my first drivers license, and other things.. I sat and just cryed over the box for about an hour..

I also think it's cool to find somebody else that was also a Boingo fan.. that was our theme music.. :)

I wish I hadn't read Spudnuts' entry.

Spudnuts wrote:
> I can talk to Wesley Crusher from my goddamned toilet!

I'm just glad he didn't say "Uncle Willy" or I'd have never gotten that image out of my head.

--NT

I wish I hadn't read Spudnuts' entry.

Spudnuts wrote:
> I can talk to Wesley Crusher from my goddamned toilet!

I'm just glad he didn't say "Uncle Willy" or I'd have never gotten that image out of my head.

--NT

I wish I hadn't read Spudnuts' entry.

Spudnuts wrote:
> I can talk to Wesley Crusher from my goddamned toilet!

I'm just glad he didn't say "Uncle Willy" or I'd have never gotten that image out of my head.

--NT

I think Pink Floyd said it best

Ticking away the moments that make up the dull day
You fritter and waste the hours in an off hand way
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way

Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today
And then one day you find that ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun

And you run and run to catch up with the sun, but it's sinking
And racing around to come up behind you again
The sun is the same in a relative way, but you're older
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death

Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time
Plans that either come to naught or a half page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in a quiet desperation is the English way
The time is gone the song is over, thought i'd something more to say

I turn thirty in two months. I'm still capable of having a teenage crush on Thom Yorke. I still decorate my room with Clash posters. I still spend entirely too much money on childish bullshit, and I have a ten year old son that I adopted out that I still have contact with. It fucks with my head. You have my sympathies.

Oh, and another thing: I was told by a friend that your twenties are just a dress rehearsal for your thirties, and that you feel relieved that you don't have to do your twenties again. I don't know if that applies to me or you, but it's something to think about.

Hang in there.

Aphonia

Wil,
Having never met you or anyone else who has written here, I find it so awesome, that even tho we come from different parts of the world, and are in different times of our lives, we are all so very much the same inside. Keep up the good work!

When I look back on my pre-30 years, I always feel like it was a time when I could have done so many things and just didn't. Why didn't I go with all of my friends on that trip to New York? Why didn't I go to that Cure concert in 1985? Why didn't I pose for the Playboy series, "Women of the SEC" back in college? The biggest loss I feel is the loss of time.

Hmmm... Wil, as has been pointed out elsewhere in this thread, 30 is just a number. You're only down because this number is giving you an opportunity to remember how far you've come, with both the good and the bad consequences of that.

Being the sci-fi person you are, I assume you've read Orson Scott Card's Ender series. If you haven't, read them. Especially the later novels: Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and particularly Children of the Mind. Ender's character is interesting because he too was a child hero, precocious beyond anyone's expectations, and by the time he was a teenager, he had done more than most people do all their lives. Above all, he had committed atrocities that he would have to live with for the rest of his life. Ender's Game deals with that loss of innocence; the subsequent novels explore how that kind of childhood shaped his adult life.

Of course, this is just a story, but Card's genius has always been his ability to backhandedly offer remarkable insights into the human existence. It's made me think more deeply about life, and I'm not quite 19.

On the flip side: "Speak for yourself. I plan to live forever."

I think you've explained the way many of us feel. I'm only 25, but every day I have "adult" things to deal with. Get up early, go to work, pay bills, pay taxes, deal with traffic ridden commutes, etc. Back in our childhood, we only had to worry about what we were doing after school and that weekend. Homework was another headache to deal with, but thinking back to my high school days, I would gladly trade my "adult" life for those days gone by. Every time I hear those 80's tunes or see those old tv shows, I always feel a pang of sadness. Sad that those days are gone...

But then I turn to me boyfriend as a cheesy 80's song comes on the radio and do our horrible lip syncing and air guitar, then one of us will catch the other off guard and soak them with a water gun or silly string.

Those days of youth may have gone, but that doesn't mean we can't act like a kid every now and again! It's great stress relief. Trust me.

i just visted the college bar back in good ol' denton, texas, this weekend.... talk about nostalgia! there was a band playing on the roof and my drinks were made right all night! made me even kinda want to return to texas, because the nights in april are just about the best weather ever (for tx, that is) but then i remembered that i've moved on... left that behind... and am probably better off for it.

Don't cry Wil, that bums me out to hear about that.

Wil, I turn 40 exactly one month after your b-day (8/29). I remember turning 30 as being nostalgic and fun (one of my students gave me a gag gift of "Just for Men" grey hair remover). I believe we can be as old as we decide to be. My 70-year-old mother can run circles around me and maintains a childlike (not childish) and inquisitive interest in the world around her. People *always* think she is younger than she actually is. When I was in Ireland a few weeks ago, I met a 93-year-old lady who whose mind was clear as a bell and I had more fun at her house for 2 hours than anywhere else on the island.

You said it yourself in one of your blogs the other day: Stay Gold. If you stay gold, the chronological age won't matter.

Peace

Ahud

Wil,

I'll be 49 in two weeks. Don't think THAT hasn't pushed a few buttons for me. I can't believe it myself because in some ways I still feel 18.

But, there's a secret. We old kids can tell you young kids about it until we're blue in the face -- but you won't believe it anymore than I did when I was turning 30.

And the secret is: when you get older, you get more comfortable in your skin. It's not the same as having "that edge" that we all savor when we're in our teens and twenties. It's different. And it's indescribably delicious. Sure it comes with a sharp whiff of nostalgia, but that's part of the package.

Savor what you're experiencing -- you'll do it again and again as you grow older. And that "edge" is a movable bar on the scale of life.

You'll be amazed where it will take you.

Wil, (and all you commenters!) I couldn't have said it any better, and I don't think I can honestly add anything that the rest of you haven't already said. I'm just going to sit here, listen to the 80's station on the radio, and smile wistfully because now I know I'm not alone.

Wil, man, it must be the planetary alignment getting everyone into a blue funk. Me included. Nostalgic for all sorts of things....

You know who NEVER cries?

Corey Feldman.

Bitch.

Don't show weekness to either one of the Coreys.

We've come so far.

Don't throw it all away now.

You show weekness to one of the Coreys and they will fucking eat you for lunch.

Oh man, I just turned 40 and with my second girl just born I have felt exactly the same way for a couple of months... I don't think youth is wasted on the young, I just wish it lasted longer....

Tiffany doesn't cry.

Carrottop doesn't cry.

You think Pauly Shore cries?

He doesn't.

Bill Shatner doesn't cry.

ACT LIKE A MAN!

larryb said:

>> Oh man, I just turned 40 and with my second girl just born I have felt exactly the same way for a couple of months.

See.

Now it IS over at FORTY.

I mean, who are we kidding here?

Yeah.

You're definitely done.

No lie.

I won't blow smoke up your ass.

The good stuff is all behind you.

I spelled weakness wrong twice.

Dang.

Getting too old for this Internet shit.

Hey Wil!

You need to stop stealing my crises!!

My own "rant" took on a vaguely different tone, but amounts to the same thing.

I'm turning 25 in less than a month - and I find myself going through a "quarter life crisis"

Seems our "moods" follow each other.

I guess what I'm saying is - I know what you're feeling, and I thank you for sharing it with all of us. :-)

Athena

I really appreciate everything that everyone has said here.

It's strange: some of my friends have called me, and my mom, too, in tears, telling me that this really struck a chord in them.

That's not what I was trying to do, really. I was just writing about what's on my mind.

This is one of those entries that is going to get printed out for The Wife to read. :)

Thank you to everyone who has commented, and shared their feelings both here, and in emails. :)

And Happy Earth Day, Gaia.

Turning 30 wasn't that bad for me. I'd been looking forward to it for a long time, actually, because 30 represented the big time to me, adulthood at last. My Dad would stop calling me "kiddo," I wouldn't get carded at the liquor store anymore, and my car would magically turn from an '88 Toyota to...anything made in the '90s. Didn't happen. I did finally buy a new car on my 31st birthday, but my Dad still calls me "Kiddo" and I do get carded a lot. (It's the curse of perpetually looking 19. Bet you can sympathize with that, can't you, Wil?) I turn 32 in 3 months. I'm pretty happy with my lot right now -- got a loving husband, a bright 3-year-old daughter, and a '98 Saturn. Can't complain. So don't stress about it, Wil. Sure, think about the past. But don't mourn it, celebrate it. And be present in your life, in these moments as they pass you by. Someday you'll look back on this, too, and wonder where it's gone.

I turned 31 in February. I have two children and a house. I have a dog and a car and my boy is potty learned. My husband has a great job.

The last movie I went to was LoTR, and it was the first time in two years. I havn't been out to dinner since the children were born. The last time I was up past midnight was to clean up the toys and finally wash the kitchen floor.

I hear ya, Wil.

Damn now you got me depressed and "hyper-nostaligic"(good word BTW) again!.. I think its one of those rites of passage. I turn 30 in 6months and have been thinking the very same things the last couple of months.

I don't particularly want to go back to the hell that was High School, but 22-25 would be cool.

Wow.

Makes me think much of my version of the same memories. I've not seen the inside of the house I grew up in since 1992, & the neighborhood treehouse was torn down in 1995.

Balancing those carefree memories and the desire to trade them for all the troubles my ex- may commit isn't nearly as temping though. My best friend, the one with the tree house, still lives in that house in the basement with his parents.

I'll take the responisiblity of adulthood, with all its consquences (good and bad), thank you.

WHEW! I'm so glad I still feel/act like a kid.. with very little responsibility. Having only to worry about one's own well being does have it's plus side. I'll be 28 in June, and my life is actually looking better than my teenage years. Sure, there are parts of my "childhood" that i get totally nostalgic about, but I refuse to "grow up," so I don't see much as lost to me.

I always feel so sad for young people that are in a big damned hurry to be "adults" with all the stress and responsibility (and bills *shudder*) that goes with it.

Shit Wil I know what you mean. I'll be turning 27 in one week from today. I feel a little different though. I mean I had such a crappy time growing up that I feel like things were supposed to be easier. I feel like I missed something. Like a break or something. So I guess I sorta had one year just to have fun. Actually only 6 months. April of my 21st year through October of my 21st year. No responsiblities. Just working a crappy job and partying with my friends. I could do whatever I wanted. I would go to my crappy job and just be Soooooooooo Happy. Everyday was a vacation for me. The birds were singing, the sky was blue. But then I started to feel like I was wasteing my life. So I left my low responsibility job quite hanging around the people I partyed with. (They really were bad influences, very bad.) And I got an Adult Job. An Adult Apartment. I started chasing a dream of happiness that wasn't really mine. Now I'm chasing another dream. One that will permit me to be free from this life. I have no kids and never will. That's one less thing for me to deal with. Finacial Freedom. I hope that permits me the time to breath, before my youth is all gone. 3 years to 30. Gahhhh. When the Hell did that happen? Life is what passes you by when you're not looking. Maybe I'll just stop and look around a bit.
Good Luck Wil. I know the passing of youth can be hard on some people. I hope you can recover quickly so you can realize how much time you really have left to have fun. Shit look at Shatner he's way the fuck old, but he's still liven' it up.

I think you're my male version of me.

I'll be 30 next month.

I hear after 30 is better anyway. You've gone through all the bullshit searching and doubts of the 20's and are finally comfortable enough with yourself to just be.

I turn 30 in four months, and it hits me at weird times. I was reminiscing with my older brother the other day, and we were recalling bad 80s tv shows ("That's Incredible" being at the forefront). Eek, just had another flashback.

Yea, the 80's were pretty kickin' here too. Running through the woods, not caring about anything or worrying about the smallest thing. As long as we can hold on to those good memories.. then I think we always bring our childhood along with us. It's harder to find.. but it is there.

"So when I saw this commercial last night, it hit me: I'm turning 30 in 3 months."

RENEW! RENEW! RENEW!

:-)

Damn. It's posts like this that make me really love your blog, man. Now I'm all, Mr. Sensitive-like and shit. *snif* Thanks a lot, ya fucker.

I'm right there with you, Wil. You know how you said that when you had it good that you were to arrogant or whatever to know better. I wish that I could have been a little more arrogant and not cared a FUCK what the "cool kids" thought of a geek girl like me. I could have had so much more fun instead of sitting arround moping that I didn't have the "right" kind of clothes to wear. Hey, all you 30 year old "cool kids" -you can kiss my ASS!!

I competely understand where you are coming from. I am 23 years old but looking at my students at school and listening to them I feel the same way. they think not having the newest flip flops is a crises and I am worried about saving rent money. grr getting older is hard. I can't imagine what having kids that age is like. good luck :)

God, Wil, way to depress us. I suddenly desperately miss the 80's now, too, and I was only 7.

wow and i thought i was depressed this past weekend. We went to see my college friends and realized wow we have changed. We only graduated three years ago. I felt sad cause not all my friends were there. Things changed really quick. I found myself wishing it was the fall of 97 when I was a junior in college. It was then I met the best of friends or so it seemed. Things changed we all went our seperate ways and I felt like balling. We decided we had to visit more and I said what I always wanted to say. It was touching. I felt odd reading this and actually finding out that you was practically thinking about similar aspects. I guess I just wanted to say wow things change.

Wow.... you saw that advertisement too, huh? I am not quite 30 yet, but approaching fast (just turned 29 this month!). I have been "hyper nostalgic" (great term by the way) off and on for the past year and can completely relate to how you feel. Only now , not so much. Too much to look forward to! The past was fun, but I like it right where it is...

Boy, Wil, your post today reall struck home for me. I'm turning 30 in 5 months (ha ha! I'm younger than you) and am alternating by being very happy where I am at in life right now and missing my younger youth so damn much it hurts. Thanks for reminding me that I'm not the only one.

True story, though I don't remember the names or the exact quotes.

A 60 year old woman was starting out on a completely new life project. She asked her 80 year old friend whether it was foolish for her to start something completely new at her age. The 80 year old said you're asking the wrong person. She continued: I'm 20 years older than you and I'm starting something new myself, something I've never tried before and you my dear are just a baby.

So at almost twenty-nine...knowing that there is an 80 year old that regards a 60 year old as a "just a baby"; it makes me smile and worry a little less about the time going by so quickly. A lot has past, but there is also much more to come.

Hope this brings you a smile as well.

Wil, I couldn't have put that any better than you. The 80's were a great time not because of anything historic, but because it was our youth. There has been many a time when I think back to how carefree those days were hanging out with my friends and my biggest worry was what we were going to do tonight. I so miss those times. I so miss those people. But time has changed everything and though I still keep in touch with some of those people, many more are lost because of the different paths we all chose.

But I also have things to look forward to. I've been married to a great woman now for almost 7 years and have a beautiful 2 year old daughter that I can't wait to share more of myself with as she gets older. If only there was someway to take what I have now and combine it with the feeling of youth. I would be the happiest person in the world, especially if I didn't have to worry about paying the bills!

Will,

You are such an awesome writer, I hope you realize that! I love reading your blog. You are NOT old, but I do understand your feelings. I am turning 40 in September, and I am definitely feeling it. I can't deny that I don't enjoy the sound of it. I've been trying to figure out what it is about it that I don't like. I guess it's just a societal image that somehow has stuck in my head.

And then I think, when I'm 60 I'm sure I'll wish I was 40. So just enjoy it now, and don't worry about the past. Cherish it and make the most of NOW cause that's all we have.

'nuff said...and I still love "The Buddy System".

Denise

Oh and I almost forgot-the Danny Elfman score from Batman is awesome! But then again, most everything Elfman does is!

Will, today's my birthday. I'm turning 17. So many times in the past few years of my life, I've looked back on my life, and wondered about how easy things were, and how hard they'd appeared at the time. I'm glad that I've realized that as tough as life is now, some things will be harder. But others will be easier. And growing up doesn't always mean getting old and out-of-date. It just means learning more. Everything happens at the time it's supposed to happen. And I realize that as a 17-year-old I don't exactly have the greatest experience in the world, but I believe I'm right here. And besides, wouldn't you rather see your step-sons become teenagers while you're 30 and still have hopes of being cool, rather than 40 and 'old,' or younger and unprepared?
I wonder what they'll be calling classics when I'm 30...

I get these feelings from time to time and I'm only 19! I'm turning 20 soon and I'm glad to know that doesn't mean I won't be a kid anymore. I can't stand the thought of growing up. I have nostalgic feelings all the time, I guess that explains the tv theme songs on my computer. But then again, I had the same don't-wanna-grow-up feelings at 10, so that's life. Hang in there Wil.

I have to move out of residence this week as the school yeah is over, and I'm having that feeling in heaps. My first year is over. Where did it go? Sometimes we could slow down life, just a little bit, wouldn't that be nice.

My oldest brother is eight years older than I am. When I turned 30 (badly; I was working a horrific job at the time), he told me that your 30s are the best time, and he was right. You're old enough to know more of who you are, but young enough to have fun with it. He was absolutely right. You will hate turning 30, and you will LOVE it after that.

Uhm, I didn't read all the comments, hell you probably won't read this considering all the great lovin' advice here, but uhm... I was a strange kid. I mean heck, I wanted to grow up fast like any of them, but I had so many adults saying "You're young, kid, enjoy it!" that it became old very fast (pardon the awful pun there). I did enjoy my childhood when I could, but I remember a lot I didn't like about it. For me, childhood wasn't sunshine and lollipops. I argued a lot with my parents, I had a hard time at school because I wasn't very popular, and I only really started getting friends in my early teens. I guess what I'm trying to say is, you did the best you could during that time, all of us do. Life isn't over though, once you reach a certain age. I mean, what do you think this is - Star Trek or something? You think you're an eskimo? "Anne... get the sleigh and the dogs... I'm ready for them polar bears."

I've felt nostalgia plenty of times, but I stop and think... hang on. When I was having so much 'fun' back then, I didn't have my beautiful neices and nephews. They weren't around. My family was smaller by about ten people. I *love* those people. Shit, careers and mortgages make life harder for you, but your life is enriched so much because hey - you are a much better person now than you used to be. I'm not saying you were an asshole when you were a kid - don't take that the wrong way. I'm saying that when we're younger we're only a portion of the person we grow up to be. Life is to be savoured, every little second. Sorry, I'm ranting. Message in short:

Feel good about the past, cause it's the only youth you've got and a lot of other people had worse (trust me).

Good shit in front of you now. Look forward to it. Mucho happy life if you choose to savour it.

Advice from blog comment listings are like fortune-cookies - fun for a little while but you soon forget it when it comes to the crunch. So read often and with fresh-baked cookies.

Well said Bo.

Hey all.
Wil dude I turned 28 last year and damn its tough. But I am not even married and nowhere near it. I have a girlfriend of 3 months and friends on my water polo team and I still party alot. It's nice to actually wait til later in life to get married and have kids and pretend like you are still a kid.

Let me tell you its AWESOME. I don't even have a mortgage payment.. I live in an apartment and do whatever i want when i want. I think around 30 I may get depressed enough to get married but until then I feel your pain. I miss the innocence of not knowing what you are gonna do when you are a kid. I grew up collecting comics watching sci fi and having fun til there was no tomorrow. Soon I will be where you are minus the wife and kids but it's cool to know big willie is along with me..

AND HEY THE PRINCE BATMAN SOUNDTRACK OWNED!! "PArty Man" ruled n stuff :(

good times noodle salad

As a child of the 80s who is going to turn 30 this year, I can understand the weight of responsibilities of adulthood.

But, don't worry... you'll make a big movie and you'll make millions. Then Drew Barrymore will try to seduce you and you'll just be like, get the hell away from me.

You'll have a mansion an life will be grand.

Or, maybe you will find happiness is in making life simple. I find the older I get the more I enjoy reading philosophical texts on Taoism. Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

Good luck and keep on writing.

-BlueEgret

I've got 23 days before I get to legally drink the alkeeholl, and now I feel old.

Granted, that ain't got NUTHIN on all of you older people. You guys got to see Jaws in the theater and crap.

Me?

I gotta deal with Britney Spears being called the epitome of hot-chick-hood.

You wanna know how frustrating it is to have some younger ho being all famous and quoted and shit?

It's enough to make me feel like I'm wasting my fucking time.

I can only hope I grow up to be as jaded and cynical as Spudnuts, only not quite as male.

So, yeah, Wil? and all the rest of you?

You ain't old.

My grandma got her first speeding ticket a couple years ago.

She just turned 89.

So there is a future, so long as it's as an old lady who drives like a maniac.

Eat THAT, Spudnuts.

Actually, don't. The mental image of you doing that to my grammy... eewww.

I'm going now.

Wil, thanks for posting that. A few weeks ago the Sunday edition of the LA Times ran an 80's theme in the magazine section and I just kept reading it over and over. Felt that same sense of loss, cept for me it was growing up in Bethesda Maryland with my friends riding our BMX bikes everywhere. Spike Jonz was even in our crew. (Rockville BMX will live forever in memory)

Senior year in high school, freshman year in college, man I couldn't wait to put it all behind me and now I think I'd give a lot to go back for a few weeks. Listening to Depeche Mode, Simply Red, Fine Young Cannibals, and quite a few other bands I'd rather not admit listening to BUT they were from my era man. Then there are all those 80's teen movies. Ferris, Weird Science, Breakfast Club....ahh, where did it go and where are we going?

Wil, I’m 35, and have reflected on my life’s great regrets for five years now. This is what I’ve learned:

If I had known then what I know now… I’d be living right now with a past filled with different regrets. Perhaps I wouldn’t be living at all.

To have regrets is to wish for events to have been different, diminishing the value we place on learning from those failures. I’m not so certain that success teaches us the value of what we have as much as failure does.

A past failure still perceived as a failure, may lead to a success which otherwise would not have occurred.

My great regrets:

1. Not being more social in High School
2. Not being more successful with women in High School
3. Not completing university
4. Not leveraging my community college education as well as I could have
5. Not choosing a career path in IT earlier
6. A car accident I had nearly 10 years ago in which my passenger died

I think that my first two regrets are silly. I actually largely avoided getting caught up in a lot of frivolity. It hurt at the time, but I probably avoided even more pain.

My next two regrets are more complex. I think I wasn’t ready for university at the time, and I still have many more years to get additional higher education. As for not leveraging my education, I think that I am, just not directly. In many ways I learned what I didn’t want to do.

As for not choosing an IT career sooner – well, bad choice. Then again, it is likely that had I done so, I wouldn’t have been living in the town where I met my wife. And my children, Natasha and Alexander, would never have existed.

As for the car accident, I deeply regret my friend passing away, and no amount of learning from the experience can justify her death. But I learned a lot about the value of life and of my own character. I still think about her daily, and try hard to be a better person than I think I otherwise would have been.

In summary, forward is the way we move through time, and is the direction we should all look to.

Im turning 23 years old tomorrow. :o/

Hey Wil:
30 Something eh? Well I turn 47 in two weeks. You just gotta keep that quirky smile that everyone had so much fun with in photoshop.Yeah life throws us these deep feelings that we wonder where they came from. WTF I really like that Pink Floyd reference, it's one of my favorites TTFN

So is time a predator, that stalks us all our lives? Or is time a companion that joins us on the journey, reminding us to cherish every moment because it will never come again?

See, Star Trek movies, even the bad ones, can teach us something.

Anyway. My high school reunion is in three months. I wasn't all that fond of high school, and I have managed to forget a good percentage of the people in my class. For some reason, I've prided myself on that; that I've been able to shove aside the unpleasant people and memories and get on with life.

Last month, I encountered an old high school chum at the mall. Not a dear friend, but a friend, and someone I remembered fondly.

He had no idea who I was.

Here I was, thinking I was all superior for shoving aside the past, ready to go to my reunion and play the "Who are you, again?" card with everybody. And someone goes and beats me to it.

Part of growing older means accepting that you aren't the center of the universe. That's not directed specifically at anyone here; it's just an observation. Man, that's a tough one.

Wil, I sympathize. *wipes a tear* I was just thinking about that the other day. I'm 20 and sometimes I feel that way.

What I wouldn't give to go back to primary colors and pigtails, playing with the boy next door and watching the sun set with him... And never having to worry about anything more serious than a flat bicycle wheel.

Instead of my freaking CAR dying this week. Oy vey...

But hey, you seem to have turned out all right. There's hope for the rest of us. We just have to keep childhood in perspective.

Your writing is beautiful, by the way. Thank you for sharing your gift with us.

I love Danny Elfman! I love his Batman score!
His Black Beauty score is my favorite.

I love Depeche Mode. I love Black Celebration! I was just saying the other day how it was my favorite album.

You rock!

80's music is just too good, I wish it was still "cool" to say that you liked it....

But the funny thing is...I'm only 20, not 30...
Oh well.

ACK!! THTTHBTTHTTHBTH!!! TJS, Generations was the BEST Star Trek film!!!! Blasphemer!

I'll be 30 in four months, but I'm looking forward to it. I don't know how it happened, but just this year I finally lost my angst! You know, the 20's "angst", which I used to have a bad case of: what am i going to do with my life, crazy relationships, what job is right for me..etc. I don't really know what has actually changed this year, but it's like I settled into my skin and feel "this is me, ahhhh". And I'm going to have one rockin' birthday party!

Try being 35 un-married, no kids and still wondering when life is going to "begin".

The 80's... What a time capsule. The 80's - it seems more like "a place" than "a time", you know? Like there's a wrong turn you can make in some old video store and come out of a mall surrounded by more "big hair" than you care to think about.

You've made me want to dig out "Good For Your Soul", however...

Very moving. I read the majority of comments here and laughed and sharedd, "
that's true" feelings with some of them. The 80's were the best of times. I think
the chaos in the world today has something to do with these memories springing up
inside ourselves. I think it's more than just growing up or reaching a certain age. We're
recalling the happier and simpler times during a time in which the world seems to be spiralling out of control.

What helps me in times of mourning over days past is that I lived in a country that allowed me to have
these precious moments. How many thousands or millions starve each day in remote places around the world who
will never have the chance to look back and treasure memories such as we share here?

Ferris is 40? SOAB!

Ya know...I think I saw that same commercial...I actually bought the fucking thing though. So very very sad. Anyway, I will hit the big Three Oh this sunday and I think I've finally come to grips with it. I have three great kids, a wonderful wife, two cats and a bunny. It's not so bad really...(sob) Oh how I miss 15.

In four months I turn 41. I survived turning 30 -- it wasn't nearly as bad as everyone made me think -- and I survived turning 40. The only bad thing about that was the gray hair.

I've survived raising a teenager. That wasn't as bad as everyone made it out to be, either. It was interesting, watching those stages unfold right before me, knowing that the snotty 13 year old was going to turn into an eyerolling 14 year old, an impatient 15 year old, and then gradually turn into an adult. And at 19, he's there. Fully grown up, and I still have (I hope) a lot of my own life left to have FUN.

When you let STUFF bring you down (and it really is all just STUFF) it makes geting older more difficult. You look back and wish for the things you had as a kid. But let me tell you, when you're looking straight ahead, there's *alot* of fun out there waiting.

DUDE, you so totally summed it up man. Im like turning 30 in a month and all i seem to be thinking about these last few months has been the 80's and the fun times i had, roleplaying and cruisen the streets in my hot V8 car with my mates.
I want that time and feelings back.
Then again there was the whole teenage thing and been a uncool nerdy geek boy, plus dodging the gangbangers each day after school so you didnt get the shit beat out of you.
hmm perhaps we are better off nowadays, with our wives and kids and mortages. Sure it is a little bit more stressful sometimes. But aleast you know where we are in our lives and generally we know what we want. Plus there is the whole family thing and the joy it brings with it.

"That Prince monstrosity"?

"That Prince monstrosity"?

Wil,

We need to talk.

Surely you can't be seriously expecting me to believe that TV's WIL WHEATON is incapable of understanding the majesty of Prince's pre-stupid-name-change, pre-scrawling-grafitti-about-"how-my-record-company-is-a-bunch-of-mean-men"-on-his cheek masterpiece?

See, in the filmclip to Batdance (Bat-daaaaaaance) - and before you say "Batman doesn't dance", let me remind you of a certain episode where Burt Ward got left in the Batmobile while Batman went into a licenced venue and proceeded to strut his caped crusader stuff on the dancefloor with some mighty fine go-go girls who, if I remember correctly, turned out to be someone's henchmen - or henchwomen - or henchpeople - in that filmclip, the tiny purple GENIUS is dressed as both The Joker AND The Batman, thereby acknowledging that they both - Jokesy and Batsy - are two sides of the same twisted coin.

Pretty astute observations, there, the kind of weighty psychological observations about the nature of revenge and the fine line between heroism and villainty that never even SURFACED on Danny Elfman's "ooh look at me I'm a John Williams wannabe and Tim Burton is my BUDDY" soundtrack

The Batusi. Remember, Wil?

I'd love to see you try to batusi to Elfman's score.

You can't.

So don't try.

Even though I said I'd like to see it.

Because I wouldn't, really.

But PRINCE?

Oh, there's a whole lot of batusi goin' on there.

Bet your cowl on it.

Ho-ly shit! You're doing this when your 30?! I must've gotten a very early start on this stuff. I'm only 20 and I've been thinking like this for quite a while now. I always wanted to believe that it got better when you got older. **Are you telling me it gets worse???** I feel like I'm frittering away my time and not getting anywhere. Eveyone tells me, "My God Kris! You're only 20, you have your whole life ahread of you!" I can only think that I've already blown 20 years and I'm scared of where I'm going from here. IT GETS WORSE?? If I can't deal with it now, how the hell am I gonna' deal with it at 30, or 50??? Well, thanks for giving me another night's worth of insomnia inducing mental turmoil.

Haha. I think Wil's wife's ex-husband is the only person who could genuinley say that he hates wesley crusher.

Ok.. I'm gonna repeat what has already been said, but I need to say it.

Damn Wil.. You hit the nail on the head. I feel like that evry now and again too. My best friend, who I've known since 3rd grade is gonna be setteling down pretty soon too. I remember the nigts of hanging out at my friend Matt's house, with the guys. Dialing up the BBSes and trolling. Or sitting in Matt's back room and listening to records or just talking about stupid shit.

It's always good to know that there is someone else that is going through the same things I go through too.

Ok.. time to fire up some 80's MP3s...

Ack, I turn 28 in 5 days and dang if I knew what I was supposed to do with my life.

And with people now having families and mortgages, I keep thinking hey! When did we become adults?

Wil, I'm just loving my thirties. They are the best. Don't sweat it, and don't worry about it.

Back then in your teen years, though you are nostalgic now, you didn't know how good you had it, did you? Well, same thing applies in your thirties, but you just know how to recognize it better and be thankful for it. Instead of being scared, be excited at what is to come and that you are older and wiser to experience it more fully.

Anne

Wow! That is EXACTLY like how I feel. I know that is almost the same comment everyone else has, too.

I am turning 30 in like 61 hours (officially, 10:17 am, 4/25) and for the past few days (maybe even weeks) I have been in the wierdest funk.

I just keep remembering all that is to remember and realizing, no matter how much I think about it, I can *never* go back and "re-live" it. It just makes me really sad. I know that "the best years are still ahead" and all of that bullshit, but it still doesn't change exactly how I feel, here and now, getting ready to leave my twenties and enter my thirties.

And, I know it's also not the end of the world, but, like it or not, I'm probably a little more than finished with a 1/3 of my life, which means I've only got another 2/3's left...if I'm lucky. So, I know how you feel, and I share your pain, Will.

That's so sad... I'm 16 and I've been going off on tangents recently about SATs and AP tests and how i should be savoring my youth while it's here, but wow. That just sums up what I worry about. I worry that I'll graduate college, end up sitting in some cubical and wishing I had gone out with my friends more, made more memories. Dang, they tell us to grow up and take it, but this is nuts. We're only teenagers for so long. I will do great things, I'm sure of it, but for now dammit I am going to be a kid!

hrmf. gonna be 33 next year. Life is good anyway, i guess.

Oh, by the way...I want to apologize...I *know* it's W-I-L, not W-I-L-L (like I typed)...sorry :-)

Wil, I turned 49 this February and have 4 kids from this second marriage: 13, 11, 8 and 4. I gave up a career as a trial attorney to raise em and to help my OB/Gyn husband. We've had about 4 moves in the last six years, hoping that each one would be our last. You just have to endure, sometimes, hon. The fact that you have a great wife and stepkids should help in that fact. And, all the posts here seem to say that you are loved and supported in your journey. We all feel, sometimes, that our best years are behind us. But, you know, I really think the "old geezers" like myself who have posted have hit on it: it really does get better: different, to be sure! but better. Hang in there! Karen

You are born, you listen to a lot of music, and then you die. It's realy not that complicated.

Let me first apologize for the length of this post! Then, allow me to apologize for the apparent jab at Sweet Uncle Sparks! ;-)

I'll be 29 this coming January. I am not married ... nor do I hold much hope of ever being married ... I've been dating the same woman since I was 21, and, in a situation typical in my life, SHE'S the one skittish about marriage. If I'd had half the chance, I would've married her years ago. She's afraid of change, though, and all she says of marriage is "I want a wedding, but I don't want to be married." About children? I don't expect them ...I've looked forw