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Happy Birthday to Me (Transcript)

by Michael Morton

They say it's my birthday, but they wouldn't let me cry even if I wanted to. Now that I've hit the quarter of a century mark, insurance companies are suddenly convinced that I'll no longer be such a hellfire behind the wheel, and I can get a car from rental agencies other than Rent-a-Wreck.

Yes, there are big reasons to celebrate today, but this will be the last milestone for awhile. I have to wait 40 years to qualify for social security, at which point I can also qualify for the senior's discount at McDonald's.

So this birthday feels like a pivotal event. I am no longer a carefree, early 20-something post-college graduate. The last barriers, small as or imagined as they were—have been lifted to being treated like a real adult, and now I have to act like one. Graduate school will be ending soon, and it's time to break my five-year string of internships and find a real job. I don't have a five-year plan, but I feel like I should have some sort of timeline. Then again, whenever I hear the phrase five-year plan I think of the failed Soviet schemes of the 1930s. Yeah, that sounds like a good idea.

My father was 25, when I was born. At the time, he didn't have a five-year plan either, but having to change diapers drew him further away his youth, and eventually onto the road of responsibility. That road is not necessarily without its perks, but it's easy to feel disoriented and directionless when you realize you are on it. Now that I'm 25, it seems like any choice I make will have more of an impact on my life than it would have just a year ago. Perhaps I should lay aside my dream of being a ski instructor—or put it on the shelf for awhile. Such endeavors are fine when one is 24, but at 25 it's time to get serious.

For those that haven't done the math yet, my dad will be turning 50. That's the hardest part about aging—seeing older friends and family grow old. Not that he's a geezer—he can still downhill ski with me and go bike riding. But he's slowing down. He's starting to forget things and has to double-check himself now. And after a day of planting pine trees on some new property recently, his hand hurt for a week Two years ago that would not have been the case.

Growing up, our heroes are always older, and now that my father and his idols both have gray hair, he wonders where the time has gone. But he also says that at this age, he is now comfortable with who he is, and can now do things without worrying about what other people will think.

So I'll embrace this age, and not be envious of those early 20-somethings who can still afford to act like kids. It's time to go eat some of the German chocolate birthday cake my mother sent me. I'll save you a piece—as long as you were born before March 7, 1978. For Columbia Radio News, I'm Michael Morton.