middle age reflections on billy joe shaver and the life aquatic of steve zissou

Billy Joe Shaver wrote this song.

The other day was my ex-wife's birthday. I wasn't there to celebrate. I went to my job raising money for non-profit organizations. Then I had lunch with Chris Lockett.

I've thought a lot about the nature of parting over these last three years. And I've thought a lot about the nature of age and aging, too. A lot of it turns into bargaining, i.e. "If I just just have this, I'll do that" and so on. I doubt that it works, no matter how many vows one might make.

A friend of mine who is in her early 20's just broke up with a guy in his mid 30's. Likely it's gonna have harder ramifications for him than for her. He's asking himself how many more of her he's likely to encounter, and she's looking at an oncoming line of relationships.

The Life Aquatic of Steve Zissou is a Bill Murray movie I love, basically about not living up to your early promise but finding some way of reclaiming a little bit of who you aspired to be. I know that feeling. Here you are, middle-aged, and maybe the fifteen glory minutes are behind you now. What's worse, the version of you that people see is a man in the shadow of his own fifteen minutes. It's not an easy feeling. I know a lot of people who are famous for what they did in the eighties, and too many of them are ambivalent about having an audience that comes to the shows because of something from back when.

Too often, I feel like I trusted the wrong instincts, and that I'm making up for lost time, and trying to do it with less energy. The curse of middle age: you know better, but have less energy and are too often suspicious of your own motivation.

"Am I doing this because it's an honest impulse, or because I'm trying to look good?"

What I've learned from Billy Joe Shaver and Steve Zissou is that it's never to late to get on with your life. Do your best, and maybe you even die trying. Some folks will try to hold you down, but it's probably not their fault, but that doesn't mean they're your responsibility, either. You will take your lumps, but you'll move on. Or else.

I joke about basing my life of the teachings of Hank Hill, Groucho Marx, and/or several other wonderful characters. But middle age is teaching me the profundity of what Arthur Ashe said (on a birthday card Lori Lakin Hutcherson gave me).

"Use what you have, do what you can."

Billy Joe Shaver's songs remind me daily that I might be an old chunk of coal, but I'm gonna be a diamond someday.