Nothing makes me feel any older than going to a wedding and watching kids dance. The enthusiasm and energy of some 20-somethings is contagioius and I love watching them take over the dance floor, but I get tired just watching them from the sidelines while I wait patiently for a "slow dance" to come up in the rotation.
My favorite movie is "It's a Wonderful Life" with Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed. Its the heartwarming story of a man who is faced with losing his life's work and possessions and is so overwhelmed by it all that he considers jumping off a bridge and ending it. Anyway, it's a classic so I don't need to go into details about the plot, but what I was getting at was that there is one scene where the two main charaters are out front of a home where an older man is watching them and he finally waves his hand in disgust and utters the phrase "Aw, youth is wasted on the young!"
I think about that line so many times now that I am older. If only I had known then then what I know now I would have danced with more abandon, laughed with more entusiasm, and just generally lived life with more gusto, knowing that it was brief and every moment is to be savored. I would have spent less time worrying about what people were thinking about me and less time worrying about what I looked like or sounded like or anything else that might have made me enjoy moments more fully when I was in them.
It's not too late for me to live it with more freedom though, and I think I will.
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