October 5th, 2025 – My 56th birthday.

This is the fifteenth entry in my series of annual birthday reflections. Something I started doing shortly after I began my writing journey in the fall of 2011. As I sit here now, drinking coffee on this beautiful fall Sunday morning, it’s hard to believe that I’m officially closer to 60 than I am to 50.

It seems like it was only yesterday I was the youthful teenager driving my pals around in a beat-up 1973 Toyota station wagon, hauling my guitar to lesson every week, going to the Palmer Park Mall on Friday nights after school, pouring what seemed like millions of dollars worth of quarters from summer lawn mowing money into video game cabinets, having my fill of Orange Julius and wishing I could somehow muster up the courage to go over and talk to the cute girl who was standing with her friends outside of the Listening Booth record store.

Wasn’t I the one who was able to go to rock concerts and stay up until the wee hours of the morning and still be able to get up for school the next day? I was the one who could sit in some dingy downtown diner deep into the night; chain smoking cigarettes, eating french fries smothered in imitation cheese sauce and drinking gallons of coffee. Talking with my friends about our plans to take on the world and make all of our dreams come true. And who could possibly forget singing ̶h̶o̶r̶r̶i̶f̶i̶c̶ beautiful three-part acapella versions of Eagles songs in the parking lot until 2 a.m. until ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶p̶o̶l̶i̶c̶e̶ ̶a̶r̶r̶i̶v̶e̶d̶ we finally called it a night? Then to get home and lay there alone in the dark, listening to the whirring hum of a portable fan and feeling excited about the possibility of everything we’d just talked about coming true, before finally drifting off to sleep. These days, I’m lucky if I can stay up past 10 p.m.

There’s an odd sense of immortality you have when you’re young that makes you believe time will always stand still. One that pulls you close and then whispers in your ear, telling you that you’ll never be as old as your parents. But then one day you take a nap and wake up in their role and realize your parents are gone and time waits for no one. 

To give you some perspective, my father died twenty-eight years ago this month at the age of 51. As of today, my birthday, I’ve outlived him by five years. My mother died in March of 2020, already five years ago. A few months ago, one of the friends who made those many coffee and cheese fry runs with me and talked about taking on the world with our music passed away at the young age of 55.

A few years ago I stumbled upon my Easton Area Middle School student ID card. It was hiding beneath a pile of old knick knacks and memories in the crawl space of my basement. Why I decided to keep it all these years I’ll never know, but seeing it reminded me of the day my homeroom teacher (Mrs. Katz) handed them out in the fall of 1980. It was the first time I ever received a photo identification card of any kind, and although I didn’t much care for my fresh-faced goofy grin photo on the front, there was something printed on the back of the now worn, laminated card that had immediately caught my attention.

There among my bus route and home room information were the words, “YR GRAD-87.” It was the first time I saw the year of my future high school graduation (1987) and the first time I believed it was so very far away. To this shy eleven-year-old boy, seven years seemed like an eternity. The very idea of a youthful me not only seeing the year 1987 but eventually living in the year 2000 and beyond was the equivalent of having a starring role in The Jetsons or a Star Wars movie. It was inconceivable for me to even comprehend living in the space age. My parents were both very much alive at the time as well as both sets of grandparents and all of my classmates and friends. I didn’t have a job, or any roles and responsibilities for that matter, and the only things I looked forward to back in 1980 was Pizza Friday at school, my birthday, Christmas and summer vacation. As far as I was concerned, seven years away could’ve been seven hundred. 

Fast forward and here I am now, sitting on a couch with a scruffy beard and a bit thick in the middle, celebrating my 56th birthday thirty-eight years post high school and twenty-five years beyond the year 2000. It’s mind boggling to think that we’re already 25% of the way through another century. Back in 1980, I thought I had all the time I’d ever need, and now I often find myself feeling the urge to make the most of the time I have left. 

So let’s finish this birthday post by talking about what’s going on now, in the present day. In addition to continuing to do interviews—hopefully, you’ve read a few of them— and watercoloring, this year I finally released a brand new book, “Beyond What We Know.” To say that it’s been a long time coming is an understatement. My last one, “Neapolitan Sky” came out in April of 2018.

The new book has been an absolute joy. Not only for getting to share a soft launch at a retro arcade, but also from seeing so many friendly faces at the book signing I did in September. I dedicated the book to my dad and my friend, Scott, who passed away in April. If you read the story, you’ll understand why.

I think I may celebrate this day by driving my 1965 Mustang (which inspired the new book) to breakfast at the local diner. While there, I’ll drink coffee and reminisce about my life and the friends who’ve moved on. Who knows? Maybe I’ll even get a double order of cheese fries now that I’m eligible for the 55+ discount menu! I’ll also think about the plans and dreams we all made that came true, and the ones still left to find.

Or as Walt Whitman once said: “Keep your face always toward the sunshine ~ and shadows will fall behind you”

In the meantime, I hope this day and my next trip around the sun brings all of us a newfound sense of hope, peace and most of all, love. 

Jim