The Tao of Hauling Ass

I’m not old, but I’m behind. That’s my analysis of my life at the present time. Having seen many of my closest peers settling into something resembling adulthood, away from that self-centered universe I currently inhabit, I can’t help but feel like I’m dragging ass towards the rest of my life. My friend Steve and his doting wife are expecting their second child this summer. My cousin Brian married about six months ago. My cousin Robert, who is a year my junior, is married with a kid. Even my good friend Jasmyne, who's the closest to me in terms of a bohemian lifestyle, is currently living in sin with a guy she adores.

Then there’s me, four years out of college and just now settling into what may be considered a “career path.” I’m single and largely unavailable (don’t want to compound my own hang-ups with somebody else’s), and thankfully I don’t play Dungeons and Dragons or I’d be that guy who’s still living in his mother’s basement, etc, etc.

It’s odd that the weight of passing time is hitting me now, just when things are finally starting to go my way. I’ve gotten my foot in the door of the medium I’ve been trying to crack since college. I’m thirty pounds lighter since the beginning of the year. I’m in the best shape I've been in since hitting my 20’s. And in general, I’ve had a reasonably good disposition (for me anyway). Still, even as I’ve reached a point of contentment I couldn’t have foreseen even a year ago, I'm frustrated that I didn’t reach this point one year, two years, even four years ago.

Still, part of me still feels young and virile for one reason and one reason only: I can still sprint. There’s a scene in the new Mission Impossible where Tom Cruise hauls ass through Hong Kong. It’s a long take that goes ten seconds longer that it should have, but Tom Cruise is booking down the streets like a track star. Acts like that have become my gold standard for youth. It’s something nobody seems to do when they get older. Ask yourself when was the last time you ran as fast as you possibly could. Up until a few weeks ago, it had been years for me. There’s just no need to sprint as we get older. Some of us jog. A lot of us walk. But virtually nobody feels the need to sprint.

I do, though. There are songs that make me want to race through the hallways of KWQC during my workout. Movie trailers make me want to go action-star and leap over chairs (or, if they’re for romantic comedies, to race after a girl through the airport). It’s about vitality. It’s about intensity. It’s about urgency. It’s a little ridiculous, but I have a need – a need for speed.

As long as I have the virility to run the way Ethan Hunt races through the streets of Hong Kong, as long as I feel well enough to bolt through a crowd screaming “Get down! Get down!” (the ability, not the justification) all this prattling on about wasted years will just be the occasional pangs of vanity that we’ve all been subject to at one time or another. It’ll just be me talking about getting older. Not feeling like I'm getting older.

So, if you ever see me randomly take flight down a hallway or across a street or through your backyard, don’t be afraid. Sometimes I just need to remind myself of my own energy, my own vitality. In the sage words of Forrest Gump, sometimes I just feel like running.