Thoughts On A Career

4:30am at work. How many times have I been in this exact spot for the past forty years? Sitting at my desk playing drums with a ball point pen and pad of paper for Joseph Arthur’s song, “Chemical.” Sometimes wandering mindlessly both inside and outside.

I used to love this shift in my younger days when I engaged in recreational sports such as week night and weekend softball and basketball. And also working a second job on the side. Those days seem like eons ago and also like yesterday. Or maybe I just thought being awake at this insane hour was full of fun times and adventure. Sure do hate the hours now though. Things change with age. What the hell was going through my mind back then? Now I’d almost prefer eating bugs to working these hours.

I stumble around half awake and fully exhausted. Someone tells me that I look tired, which I vehemently deny but my denials are a thin façade. Why bother denials anyway. Either I look tired or somewhere opposite. Personally stumbling around the way I am, I wonder if I look drunk.

How many times have I been awake at this exact moment of the day, make that the night, over the past forty-plus years?

Did it ever enter my mind when I first signed on that this would turn out to be my life? The year 1975 then and it’s like I closed my eyes for just a moment and upon opening them it’s 2016.

I can see a thousand faces pass by while my eyes are closed, who once shared this experience but I’m the only one remaining in this place

I seem to recall reading somewhere that this type of lifestyle tends to shorten ones lifespan. I suppose that’s what one gets for lacking focus and the discipline to get down to business in their college years. Let me be an example to the youth of the world then. The poster boy of considering the opposite path. Of not doing like I do (or did).

But consider for a moment that many people never made it this far. I’ve never known real hunger. I’ve always had a warm place to call home. When I started out I used to wonder how I would survive year to year. Then one day I realized that it all worked out. I’m a mess but hey, I can still walk around. Plenty of people end up in wheelchairs before they reach this point.