Into my heart an air that kills
From yon far country blows:
What are those blue remembered hills,
What spires, what farms are those?
That is the land of lost content,
I see it shining plain,
The happy highways where I went
And cannot come again.
Is youth wasted on the young? Before answering let me pose another; is such a contention not simply born of nostalgia and regret? Do people who think like that not simply want to be young again? If you were young again, what would you do that is different? Yes, I know that you might attempt to avoid some situations, and some people, but you would still live as if you were young; and that is the whole point, not thinking about tomorrow. Wisdom does not come with age: complacency does and, yes, sorry, so does jealousy.
So, let me tell you how I ‘waste’ my youth, apart from writing this that is! I’m a student. I love the subject I’m studying and the people I study with. I have a wide circle of friends. I go to clubs, parties and social gatherings of one kind or another every weekend. I have sex, lots of sex, and though I have a steady boyfriend I am not monogamous, which he knows and accepts. I drink, I smoke, I dance and, yes, I occasionally snort cocaine. I love to go riding on Sundays, and have my own horse. I play tennis and I go sailing along the south coast of England, when the weather permits. I travel whenever I can. I was in Morocco over the New Year, where I made even more friends, and I went to India after my degree exams. I regret nothing; I apologise for nothing.
So, yes, I am seizing the day. What more would you ask of me? I’m mortal; I know I will grow old; I know I will die. But I will, still here, now and always, take life by the balls! I agree with the divine Marcus Aurelius, who said in his Meditations live each day as if it were your last. :-)
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No I do not think that youth is wasted on the young. Age is only a number! You will see that even though you grow older and wiser you still always carry that same youthful soul inside.I have seen jealousy at every age, unfortunately jealousy is a sign of instability, so just know if you are seeing a lot of jealousy in your life it has more to do with mentality than age. Nice article by the way! Enjoy being YOU, noone else can!!
ReplyDeleteI wiil, Robin; thanks so much for your comment. I'm glad I didn't shock you by my frankness. :-)
ReplyDeleteGive up the cigarettes, they will kill you before you are ready for the off. The rest need do no harm.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your concern, Duckham, but it's really only now and then, usually at parties. In any case mo more than about ten a week.
ReplyDeleteAs I walk the lanes of Essex I recall my childhood days
ReplyDeleteWhen no care stood towering over when a hitch was but a phase
And when mother welcomed me back home from school with open arms
And the highlights of the long days were the tried-and-true alarms
Why talk of reality when life and love are games and dreams
And the dreams of love are never realized, or so it seems
'Carpe diem quam minimum credula postero'. This inimitable line comes from an ode of Horace's. Imitated most sentimentally in one of the rare happy poems per se by Herrick 'To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time.'
There is a discussion at the end of Peter O' Toole's Loitering with Intent: The Child. Loitering with Intent being one of my favourite books. He is an actor and a writer in a class of his own. Anyway, the discussion is between himself and a chum concerning the size of childhood, when does it end? 'Oh Early.' Replies his friend 'Pre-puberty, that's about the size of it'
To-day words so affect me that a pornographic story, for example, excites me sexually more than a living person can do.
(W. H. Auden. The Prolific & the Devourer. 1939).
I know a little of O'Toole's work as an actor. I did not know he also wrote. If that's your favourite book, Rehan, he must be really good. I must check.
ReplyDeleteI like the Auden quote. :-)
Thanks, O' Toole is a master scholar of Shakespeare, I don't know exactly how much of Shakespeare he knows by heart but I know it is quite lot. As a writer, he has his own superb style similar to the way he converses. Interviewers who are not familiar with what they're letting themselves in for seem somewhat perplexed.
ReplyDeleteThe Auden quote has always astounded me somewhat but he wasn't getting any so it makes sense.
Well now I know why you can't join UKIP. The typical way UKIP members waste their days is
ReplyDelete1. Complain about the price of bitter
2. Complain about lazy men on road works sites
3. Make a three hour speech about Europe to people who have heard it all before.
4. Complain that they're not pretending to feign interest.
5. Complain about the declining standards of BBC's light entertainment division.
6. Complain about the price of bitter some more.
7. Threaten to emigrate to Rhodesia, and sneaking this in to every conversation, even though such a possibility is no longer an option.
...no wonder my life is so full of regrets :-)
What exciting lives you lead. :-))
ReplyDeleteI know it's great fun, you don't know what you're missing. The other week, I said I'll take two lumps of sugar, and the tea lady gave me three...I nearly collapsed from the excitement...then threatened to emigrate to Rhodesia and slept for the following three days.
ReplyDelete