Six Months Later
There is something about the holiday season that changes people. At least it seems to change me.
When I look back at my life, which is admittedly impossible to do unbiased, I realize most of the time I have spent discontent has been in the winter months, especially during the holidays. Maybe my expectations this time of year become inflated. The holidays are a time to come home from school, to enjoy vacations, see friends, get presents, give presents, and every movie or made-for-TV-special hammers into our heads that this is a MAGICAL time of year. Throw in elections, cold weather, and fiscal concerns, and it becomes quite obvious why doubt and challenges to the status quo may take control of our heads.
These past few months, the world would not let me escape growing up. It is amazing how starting a career can do that. And now I listen to NPR all the time, I very seldom stay out late, and IRAs and mutual funds are suddenly a common conversational topic. I don't think of myself as completely lame, but relative to my time as a cadet, I have calmed down substantially.
Growing up brings certain sentiments previously ignored to the forefront. The idea of settling down is suddenly less scary. It becomes much easier, then, to project these sentiments on those around us, who, with good reason, are not ready to lame-ify themselves to the extent of the projecter. Mind you all, everyone must grow at their own pace. To demand anything else inevitably breeds destruction, chaos, fire raining upon the earth, cats and dogs living together...you get the idea.
These past few months have been great. I have gotten to see so many new things. I finished up my private pilot license, proving to myself that I have it in me to be a good pilot (an essential step, as I begin pilot training in a month and a half). I have gotten to spend time, though never enough, with the woman I love. I have also learned that to succeed in my life, I need to be honest with myself.
There are so many great things, nice things happening in the world and in my life. The trick, then, is to see the world as it is and always was. This has never been the time of to focus on the bad things in life, and I think my misinterpretations of the "Holiday Spirit" have caused me to lose sight of that fact. Changes are constantly occuring without fail, and whether they occur during the holiday season or not, we cannot avoid accepting them.
To everyone in my life, then, I wish you all the happiest of holiday seasons, whatever that entails. And I pray that you all see the good in everything around you, because, in the end, that's what the holidays are about.