Getting Old
Another post about realizing how godlike time can be
Not long ago, people would look at me and say in surprise that I didn't look as old as I was. In time crow's feet started to appear and my hair slowly gave up on melanin. Jokes about it mark a new era - when people say I don't look that old, the feeling that they don't really mean it appears, as I gratefull accept the compliment.
I got used to showing my ID at many places - bars, clubs and even at kiosks, when buying a pack of cigarettes. I remember it as if it were yesterday: the last time I was asked to check my age, I was 24 when I ordered some ice cream at Friedrichstraße station in Berlin. The shock, as I gladly asked the guy "what for?" came right before the answer: there's rum in it.
The mid-life crisis has already passed me (or has it?). And as the saying goest, storm followed by calm...passed, just as many people passed through my life, checked in, and vanished. "what if..." - I've asked myself many times. I've lost people dear to me, never had a chance to do many things, and while I hear the cliché that's never too late, I don't always feel motivated or able to go for it. Nostalgia plays a big role on some days, but as an immigrant, I tend to put it aside and get on with my day-to-day business.
The Berlin Wall came down the year I was born. The World Trade Center attacks happened. Wars came, wars went, new ones appeared. COVID-19 came to change people forever... and new wars emerged.
We learn in school about WWII, colonization and ancient civilizations, but after so many years of existence, it feels now like mankind has learned nothing.
Movies sometimes create the impression that the new generation will take over and build a better world. While Baby Boomers and Gen X complain that the new generation are lost, I, as a millennial, see their actions through different lenses: I do believe they can make the world better - even as my body slowly degrades.