You can get what you want or you can just get old.

Okay yeah Billy, I hear you.

I remember the first record I ever bought - well okay my older brother bought it. After thumbing through the 99 cent bin in a hole in the wall record store for what felt like HOURS. There it was.

Billy Joel - The Stranger

It was supposed to be a gift for our mom but the two of us played both sides of that album everyday for what felt like a year. And of course out of all of those songs 'Vienna' was a favorite. 

Well I'm not 13 anymore. I've been singing this song for the better part of a decade yet I always missed the point.

And truthfully I've felt short on time since I was 15. 

" I'm getting older"

"I'm not a kid anymore"

"What am I doing with my life"

"What if I ruin everything"

Blah.........blah........blah.......

So as you can see existential dread and I are pretty well acquainted. 

I have to personally thank Mr. Joel for creating such a song that seemed to really speak to every anxiety I had as a kid.

But for the first time I listened to 'Vienna' without the company of my 13 year old self. 

And I realized... I've been so consumed with DOING, with chasing what I think I need to chase, checking off boxes, moving so fast I couldn't even begin to tell you how many lives I lived these past few years. 

That I've never just slowed down to ask myself what it is that I want. Yeah I'm worried about getting old and missing out on my dreams, but what are those dreams exactly?

I've been busy keeping myself busy.

My desire to not waste the one life I have is ironically making me waste the one life I have. Ouch. Kind of a bummer.

Better to realize it now than 15 years from now. 

And Billy was right when he sang 

Slow down, you're doing fine 

You can't be everything you wanna be before

 your time

-Izzy :)