32

I turned 32 years old yesterday. Overall, it seems like a fairly nondescript birthday. Who really goes all out for their 32nd birthday?

But, I did find myself philosophizing about aging and time more this year than normal. I am someone's dad now. I now have been driving longer than I had to wait to drive. I can distinctly remember when my parents were my age. I am getting older.

I recently read or heard (but I don't remember when or where) that the reason time "goes by faster" as we age is that each minute, day, year, decade, is a smaller percentage of our "time lived" as we get older. For example, when one is nine years old, and is waiting to be ten, that year is waiting for one tenth of your life to pass before you turn ten. But, this year, only 1/32nd of my "lived life" passed. For someone turning 80, it's 1/80th. Time does not speed up so much as that each increment is a smaller part of our total life experience.

The challenge is the same: appreciate the past and carry it with us, have eternal hope in the future, but live in the now and experience the moment, the life stage, the season, etc.

And, by the way, I had a great birthday.