A State of the Life Address

The hard thing about writing a blog that’s relevant is being transparent enough for people to see who you really are. When you say, “6ixth Man is about learning from the journey so that you have an advantage…” it sounds pithy and bogus. But here was a very real 6ixth Man worthy insight I feel God showed me. And if you don’t like that God language, focus on the insight itself and see if it resonates.

In short, I looked up last October and suddenly was 34 years old. My students at the time were gracious, if only inadvertently. They said things like, “You don’t look 34” which translated means they’d expect 34-year old men to have sunken cheeks, gray hair (if any) and an oxygen tank in tow. That said, they affirmed that I appeared to be in my mid-to-late 20s. Fine. But I knew how old I actually was and felt pretty good for an old head. Nevertheless, I looked in the mirror at my life beyond the laugh lines and darkened skin and begin falling into the comparison trap. No children, student loans still to repay and a launch into the outer regions of self-employment. Where am I? What have I done? Life is speedin’ past me. But I focused on the first item on that list. No kids…that is until I was reminded of my curriculum vitae which has included nothing but kids from college aged to elementary and back.

I don’t have children of my own yet and they’re not guaranteed to arrive but should I not count my nieces, nephew, students from my first long-term sub assignment at Charter Oak High School as my own, in a way? Should I disregard the students and student athletes of Western Christian High School or my most recent tenure at Ramona High School in Riverside? Total them all and I’ve been a father figure to hundreds and it’s not to boast, rather to remind me, you and anyone else that the lives of young people require our interest. The comparison snare looms as the 30s settle. In six years I’ll be forty and then and then…(hyperventilation)…and then I keep aging and influencing young people on their quest for God, truth and fulfillment in a perilous world. Suddenly 34 is not so bad. And I married up so it’s even better than I thought.