On 60

Today is my 60th birthday.  Most of my other birthdays have floated past without much notice or thought.  This one feels different.  I’ve noticed it coming for a while, and now it feels something like a milestone.  At least it seems to deserve a moment of reflection and assessment.

I’m hoping this marks the approximate two-thirds point of my life.  I like to think I will live to somewhere in my 90’s, as both my parents did.  I like to think I have at least another 20 active years ahead of me to see the world, grow a bit more as a human (though hopefully not gain more weight), answer a few of the questions that nag at me, see a grandkid or two.  I think (hope) I am retiring now with a sufficient nest egg to carry Barb and me through the rest of our lives and leave a reasonable legacy to Allie. I’m aware that any and all of these plans and wishes can evaporate in an instant, but I’m hoping they come true.  Plan for the best, prepare for the worst.

Things I’m Pleased About and Thankful For

• Barb.  I’m so delighted and lucky to have found a friend, love, mate, partner, spouse to have shared this life and journey with.  Lucky, mostly.
• Allie. Al is 22 now, a lovely daughter, good friend, fine traveling companion and our proudest achievement.
• Seen a lot of the world. Happy to have seen most of the places I want to see, and feel the wiser for all the travels.
• Growing up in Hong Kong.  I can’t thank Mom and Dad enough for having the chance to spend my formative years (1971-76, 8th-12th grade) in Hong Kong.  Those years shaped my entire life.
• Making enough money to retire early and reasonably comfortably. I’m very thankful I got lucky to make a considerable bundle during my career at Hekimian and buyout by Spirent.  I have lots of ambivalent feelings about my overall career, but feel very lucky to have walked away with enough money to quasi-retire and fund Allie’s altogether too expensive education (not that she wasn’t worth it, but boy the education industry can gouge you).
• Giving back a bit through FIRST, AmeriCorps and STEMaction.  I’m glad to have stumbled into the world of FIRST and STEM, thanks to AmeriCorps.  It helped assuage some guilt, gave me a sense of purpose for a number of years, and introduced me to a great community of people.  I have more guilt over how things turned out at the end with STEMaction’s acquisition by USRA, but all in all I feel like I did my bit to make a positive contribution to the world.  Could do more, or course, but at the moment I’m somewhat satisfied.

Things I’m Working On

• Answers to big questions.  Why are we here?  What is a man’s purpose?  Is there an optimal path for a life?  What does the future hold and how to best prepare?  What is wisdom?  I don’t seriously expect definitive answers, but I do hope to make a dent on investigating such things to some level of my own satisfaction.
• Balance.  I suspect that most of the answers to these big questions revolve around balance, finding the median way, recognizing and balancing yin and yang.  I’m one to avoid extremes, but I sometimes need to remind myself there’s also a balance to not simply becoming inert.
• Family.  A lesson from Mom and Dad’s final years is that at the end, if you’re lucky, it’s family that’s there for you, not many others. And the culmination of one life is a chance for gathering and closure for the younger generations. At the end of my years, I’d like to have some help and care from a broad set of folks, not leaving the whole weight on Allie.  I’m worried that being together is one of the failings of my generation of the Duncan clan, and the Fishers are not proving to be much better.  I know I can do better in my remaining years to build bridges and stronger networks, but it will take work on my part (Sue, Len, nieces, cousins…) and to convince some others (Barb).
• Health. If I’m to make it to 90+ I suspect I need to lose some weight, take better care of my heart, watch out for other risks, and wish for luck.  The best things I can do are eat better and exercise a bit more.  Both are hard for me, but need to be areas of focus for the coming years.
• Consuming thoughtfully. It’s too easy in our world to waste time and waste money.  Temptations are everywhere, and in fact is what our whole American society is built upon.  Ours is a consumer society, and I am an active participant. I want to make an effort to spend my remaining time and money wisely and thoughtfully.  Where possible, I want to lend my time and money toward causes, folks, products and philosophies that feel right to me.  At minimum, I want to be aware of my choices.
• Selfishness and laziness.  I tend toward self indulgence, daydreaming and inertia (see balance, above).  I need to watch against these habits and fight them by actually doing something constructive at least part of every day.  Constructive things in my current definition include writing, cleaning up, filing, and consuming thoughtfully.  In better days, doing something that generates income also counts.
• Cleaning up. I know one of Allie’s biggest fears is that Barb and I will shuffle off this mortal coil without tidying up our collective messes, leaving them all for her to deal with.  I’d like to be a good parent and citizen by tidying up my own table.  I also want to leave behind a hint of who I was and give the next generations a little bit of a leg up on their journeys through life.