Wasn’t going to write anything today, but then this came out of me, so…
Once upon a time, in a hospital in Detroit, a baby was born. The baby knew nothing of the life that awaited him, full of trials and misfortunes. He did not know how much he would learn on his own, or how hard he would struggle to survive. He knew nothing at all of the fates that awaited him. He was just a baby, with big brown eyes and no fear.
Time passes. The baby grows from child to adult, and faces each calamity head-on. He has the fear now, swelling under his ribcage, making him second guess his steps. His decisions are terrible, because no one ever showed him how to make a good one, and he struggles with himself more than he admits.
Then one day, he has a baby of his own, with big brown eyes, who also knows no fear. The man decides that time has come for a change in his life, to stop struggling for survival, and start living for the future. It takes him time. He makes mistakes, so many that he feels like giving up. He makes changes, some good, some bad, all in pursuit of a life that he can be proud of, so he can look at his baby boy and say “Hey, I did this for you.”
He awakes on his 38th birthday. He has four beautiful children. He has a wife he adores. He has a job he works hard at. He has a home he has cultivated. He is far from where he wants to be, but he is also far from where he has been. He wakes, and feels like a man, for once, a real man, the kind no one taught him how to be. No longer a boy full of bad decisions, or a baby who did not know fear. He has learned from these perils and it has only made him stronger. And so, he wakes, and he dresses, and prepares for his day, because age is simply a tally of what you have been though, and he knows his big brown eyes will weather the storm.
Happy birthday, baby.
Ham 'N Eggs 