I’m writing this from Gulf Shores, where a hurricane recently passed through. The sky is clear now. The water is calm. And the analogy isn’t lost on me.
This is life.
My fifties had their share of storms. A health scare. Change I didn’t anticipate. Loss. Missteps that sometimes keep me up at night.
And there were blue skies, too.
I walked both daughters down the aisle. I became a grandpa. I made new memories with my dad. I celebrated milestone birthdays and anniversaries with my family. I had fun with friends, traveled to some cool places and (big swallow) matured a bit.
This morning, I opened my eyes to 60. Sixty years old.
Me.
Sometimes I think my brain missed the memo. The guy living inside my head doesn’t feel all that different from the guy who was 30. I don’t see myself the way others see me. When someone jokes about me being an old man, my first thought is, Wait. Who are you talking about? I like Taylor Swift!
But it’s true.
Six decades. A few plot twists. Plenty of good stories. Some things I got wrong. And more blessings than I can count.
One of the greatest is the number of people who love me. People who know my shortcomings, have witnessed my missteps and have seen me fail, yet love me anyway. I don’t take that lightly. If turning 60 has taught me anything, it’s how blessed I am to have people in my corner who offer grace, give me another chance and remind me that I’m loved even when I’m far from perfect.
And as I look ahead, I picture a baseball player rounding third and heading home. Now is not the time to ease up. It’s time to dig deeper. Run hard. That’s how I want to approach whatever comes next. I want to slide in covered in dirt, bloodied and out of breath—not because I played a perfect game, but because I gave it everything I had.
I want to keep trying new things, learning, loving people well, taking chances and showing up for the people I care about, and sometimes for people who never saw it coming.
God only knows how many days I have left. But I don’t need to know the number to make the days count.
Today, at least, the sky is clear. The water is calm.
And I’m grateful.
