52+
The other week I came to a strange realization…I had lived more days compared with my father.
I realize this might seem a bit dark, even morbid. but it also gave me an opportunity to think about the significance of that date in time. It also made me think about here I am at now, where I think I want to go, and some unpleasant truths in all of this heavy thinking.
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I was 23 when my father passed away after a short battle with cancer. Even at 23, I thought 52 was an awfully young age to die at the time. The entire ordeal had a pretty significant impact on me, forcing me to grow up quickly and learn to deal with some harsh truths that come with adulthood. My college years had been pretty carefree, and I laugh now at some of the “challenges” I had at the time. A lot of that easiness was made possible by my father, having the resources to guarantee I did not have to work during college if I did not want to, allowing me to have fun on campus on the weekends (and many weeknights as well), could afford to take the unpaid internships that would (hopefully) help my future career. While I like to think I worked hard, he made a lot of that quite easy for me. And truth be told, I could have worked harder and had a little less fun in the process.
But being his son had its own challenges as well. He was the overly successful oldest son of your typical post-World War II blue collar family, He was the first to go to college and did not stop at his undergraduate degree, but went ahead and got that M.A. and Ph.D. He had a successful career as a high school teacher and counselor before moving to the university level when he earned his doctorate. He became department chair a few years later, wrote a textbook and started a private practice in addition to his university work…a fairly time consuming “side hustle” well before side hustles became a thing. He thrived in many ways doing it, but it came with a price. While there was extra money for trips, a third car I could use in high school and college, and, eventually, full tuition at a private, liberal arts college, it came at a price. Many nights away from home, either teaching or seeing patients. Lots of time with babysitters, or time with his second wife, who behaved in a manic love/hate relationship with me most of the time and it took many years to fully understand how that instability negatively impacted my life.
Now that I have lived longer, I have thought a lot about his life, as well as what I have done differently. While I have tried to emulate him in many ways, sometimes achieving a similar level of success has eluded me. I try to remember times are different now, compared with the decades he was making his achievements; it is harder to get into doctoral programs, life feels more expensive and both choices and circumstances have combined to where I have lived my life in more expensive and more challenging areas instead of living in the same state, and same two counties, that he did for his entire life.
Added into this equation has also been the making of different choices. I stepped back from my career when it was needed to make our family happier and safer when my son got seriously ill. I never thought that decision would have such a negative impact on my professional life, but it has, and I have had to regroup and start over. Would my father have given up his professional achievements to do that? Quite honestly, I doubt it. His professional life was so much a part of his identity that I do not think he would have been able to successfully separate it.
In the end, we both made different choices in our lives, with different outcomes as a result of these decisions. No doubt both of my children will make different choices in their own lives. As I look at the next stage of my own life…the one beyond 52…I hope to get away from some of the regret I have at the way certain areas of my life turned out and embrace this time I have been given. In the end, regret gives you nothing. But positivity gives you, as well as those around you, so much more.
