Fifty minutes was the length of the class period when I was in high school, also on Monday, Wednesday and Friday when I was a college student. Fifty cents used to buy a soda or a candy bar, and fifty dollars was a lot of money. Fifty cents was also what I paid for the very first gallon of gas I ever bought – well 49.9 cents, but I have never seen that .1 cents anywhere. Fifty was never a number that was my age.

In my fifty years, I have seen a presidential assassination and a presidential resignation. I’ve seen an actor, a Rhodes Scholar, a rocket scientist and a village idiot become president. I’ve seen men walk on the moon. The world has gone from an infinite place to a place you can see in its entirety in a single picture – from space.

I’ve seen computers go from a rarity, to the commonplace – and computers go from the size of buildings to something that can be held in your hand or put in your pocket. I’ve seen TV’s go from small and round and black and white to HUGE and “high definition” or yet another device you can hold in your hand or put in your pocket. Telephones? Who needs wires any more?

Milk used to come in glass bottles and be delivered door to door in the early morning hours and left in those silver boxes on the doorstep. When I was a kid, our “video games” were played in our imagination and we didn’t need a Wii controller to act out the parts.

My parents were young and they were my heroes and every other adult had my parents’ standard to live up to, and all fell far short of that standard. Sundays consisted of breakfast, church and a huge family dinner – a cycle that was repeated every Sunday – and the family dinner was at the home of my grandparents – and cousins were everywhere!

My wife and I have children ages 22 and 14 and are much closer to the end of our mortgage than its beginning. When I get up in the morning it takes longer to actually get vertical than it used to! When the weather gets cold, the aches and pains increase exponentially.

My views on politics and religion are unmovable – but I am still against the establishment! I was eleven at the end of the sixties, but I survived the seventies – so now when I am driving through town with the music playing loud – people stare at me and wonder why someone with no hair on top of their head and gray facial hair is playing rock and roll so loud.

Oh yes, that is another issue – my formerly long, curly, bleached blonde permed hair – is now just a memory! In the last five years my facial hair has steadily turned gray to the point where it is now mostly gray. As for the gray hair on the top – excuse me – on the SIDE of my head, at least it is still attached.

These are a few of the things that I have found … interesting … but not necessarily good about turning fifty. There are good things, though.

First and foremost, the good things about being fifty – my wife and our kids – I appreciate their importance to the quality of my life. Without them, fifty would equal nothing.

Fifty means I regularly tell our kids things that begin with “When I was your age…”

It means that when I forget something I can say “I have accumulated SO MUCH knowledge in my time that I can’t remember it all at the same time.”

Fifty means the word “regular” has a whole new meaning! (And I whisper this) it also means a colonoscopy is in my near future (gasp!)

Fifty means that someone really really wants me – the AARP.

It also means the younger students I work with are approaching one third my age as they get younger each year and I just get older.

Fifty means that party time is not what it used to be and I actually listen to what they say on those commercials about the little blue pill.

Sobering thoughts about fifty …

I am 2/3 of the way to my average life expectancy and the same age as my maternal grandfather when he died of a heart attack. It means that there are fewer and fewer family members who are older than I am – and the number of friends that I have seen die is not such a small number any more.

Almost all of my high school teachers and college professors have retired and many of them are deceased. Many of those who shaped my life are no longer living.

If humans, like cats, had nine lives, how many do I have left?

What I have learned …

Life is what you make of it and nothing is given to you (at least not to me). The most important things are not those things that can be bought and paid for. Ideology is greatly overrated, and common sense is greatly underrated – and each to about the same degree.

God does answer our prayers, and often in ways we least expect. Money isn’t everything – when my wife and I were first married, we made just enough to get by, and, not that we are unhappy now, but those early days were among the happiest of my life, because no matter how little we had, we had each other, and that was all we needed or wanted.

You don’t get over losing parents, you get used to not having them around. Regular visits to the doctor happen for a reason, and when that reason becomes quadruple bypass surgery, their importance is not in question any more.

You choose your friends, not your family, but when one person falls into both those categories, it is truly a blessing.

What other people think is not important. They can live their lives, I will live mine – and I will live my life to satisfy me and to provide for my family.

I am not an expert in anything, let alone dispensing advice about life. I have made many mistakes in my time, but had I not made those mistakes, things would not have turned out as they have. I think that in fifty years, I have come to a pretty successful and satisfying place.

Yes, we can make a difference, and in ways you would not have expected. Live each day as if it were your last, and if it was your last, you did it right.

I could go on and on, but I think I’ll let the words from the song “Time” by the Alan Parsons Project conclude my thoughts on turning fifty.

Goodbye my love, Maybe for forever
Goodbye my love, The tide waits for me
Who knows when we shall meet again
If ever
But time
Keeps flowing like a river (on and on)
To the sea, to the sea 
Till it's gone forever
Gone forever
Gone forevermore