28 Years Later

To quote Groucho Marx, “I was born at a very early age.”

Well, for me, that early age was 28 years ago today.

Ah, being born in the early 1980s. What a magical time. Well, parts any way. The toys were certainly better (metal Transformers? Yes please! Toy guns that looked like the real thing? Woo hoo!).

I felt really old today, while at breakfast with some area Twitter users, one of them didn’t know what the film Short Circuit was (one of Guttenberg‘s finest).

Another interesting thing is that I dug out my old Super Nintendo last weekend and started playing the game EarthBound again.  The copyright date on it was what really got my attention.  1994/1995.  I was 14.  Half my current age.  Is it interesting or sad that at twice the age I was when the game came out, I not only still own it but will still play it? (and still remember everything about it)

I’m enjoying life as a 28 year old more than that of a 14 year old, that’s for sure. Thing is, now when I can stay up until 3 AM playing the game if I wanted, I don’t have the energy for it. I’m lucky if I can handle playing for an hour straight. Fourteen years ago, that’s all I did.  Kind of funny I guess.

I’d like to know, back then as a 14 year old, where I thought I’d be at 28.  It seemed so far away back then, and now, the years fly by.

Example – A year ago today, I was Paradise, MI (Upper Peninsula) with my, now ex, girlfriend. We went to Tahquamenon Falls, followed by a bear ranch. That night, we had dinner in Christmas, MI (a little West of Munising)–so, I had a Christmas dinner on my birthday. That all seems like it happened yesterday, but it was exactly a year ago.  (I probably remember most of those details so well because it was one of my favorite birthday-days)

Today, now single, my parents are coming in from Detroit to take me to dinner somewhere in Lansing. What a difference a year makes.  And it is a far cry from the birthday parties of my early teens–renting a Sega Genesis from the local video store (prior to me getting a Super Nintendo) and staying up all night with friends playing games.

But, a lot’s happened over these last fourteen years: middle school, high school, five years of college,  joining the ‘real world’ after college,
various girlfriends, making and losing friends, losing loved ones, writing a novel, self-publishing it, etc.

Heck, in the past year alone I’ve started doing freelance writing, a podcast and found out I’ll have a short story in an anthology.

I’m interested to see what happens over the next year, let alone the next fourteen.