Another year older. Another year closer to adult diapers.

I'm turning 45. That's just a hop and a skip away from 50. (Not a hop, skip and a jump. I gave up jumping at 40. And skipping, well, that I don't do often, especially when others are around.) It's a bit scary. I never thought I would be where I am now at this age. Need I go into all the ugly details? No, I need not. It would only depress the living crap out of me. Anyway, I've been thinking a lot about that whole thing. And I realized that I am where I am in life because of myself. Not like fate or kismet or any cosmic mumbo jumbo intervened like The A-Team. It's our decisions in life that lead to our situation (or non-situation). I've made some bad decisions and some good ones, I've done dumb things and smart things. All of which have placed me clearly smack dab in the middle of the happiness meter. I'm not a millionaire playboy, which is where, as a teen, I pictured myself at the ripe old age of 45. Actually, when I was a kid, I don't know if I ever pictured myself as 45. I just pictured my 13-year-old body living like an adult millionaire playboy. Secret double-life and all. But I'm also not a down-and-out bum with bunions and a drinking problem.

Oh, man, listen to me. I sound like some guy on his deathbed considering his life. I should have 'My Way' playing in the background. I guess birthdays are as good a time as any to become introspective and consider your life. Of course, I'd rather be considering what I'm having for dinner, what I'm going to do on my next free weekend, or how they got that horse to do that thing in the video I saw on the Web the other day. You see, the thing is this, the other night, after I started contemplating all this happy horseshit, I had a couple of things take place that may or may not have me believing that some odd force of destiny is playing "let's fuck with Steve."

First, I meet this girl in Target who I had a great date with well over a year ago. Nothing every came of it, because at that time, she wasn't looking to get involved in a relationship. Anyway, we talk for a bit, and there's some chemistry there, so she suggests we get together again. I'm all for it. In the checkout line, she gives me her number, which I punch into my cellphone. Great, I think, it's pretty cool that we met again. It must be fate. Well, in all the confusion, I close my phone without forgetting to hit 'store.' I check later, and the number is gone. So, I have no way to get in touch with her, since I don't know her last name or e-mail or anything. Great. Fate was there in the beginning, but when it bent over, absent-mindedness shoved it's cold, lubed finger right up its butt.

Another night, I took the kids for Chinese food. And no, it didn't give me such indigestion that I thought I was having a heart attack and was dying, which would get me all misty and thinking about my life. Although, that had happened in the past. I'll save that for a later posting. No, it's the fortune from the cookie that got me. It read "Depart not from the path which fate has you assigned." Pretty deep for a note found in a cookie. Usually, I'll get something more bland than the cookie itself, like "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth," or "You have soy sauce on your shirt, slob." No, this night, I got that path of fate message. Great. I was just thinking that very day about how I don't believe in fate and I get something that tells me to follow it. Is that fate, or what?

So, my problem is, what the hell is the path which fate has assigned me? I didn't get the e-mail memo from fate. "Dear Steve, Your assigned fate is to watch more Aqua Teen Hunger Force, have lots of meaningless first dates, and suffer occasional bouts of irritable bowel syndrome and acid reflux. Remember, don't depart from your path!" Hey, if I got that memo, I'd be golden, well along the assigned path. But no, the fickle finger of fate did not let me in on its cruel little destination plan. For all I know, I could be halfway to Timbuktu and miles from the friggin' yellow brick road of divine will and circumstance. Maybe I should have made that left at Albuquerque.

If there's anything worse than not knowing what you're supposed to be doing with your life, it's not knowing what you're doing with your life at the age of 45. Again, it's not like I have a bad life. I have two awesome kids, a good job, great friends and family, and a really cool Elvis bust in my living room. My health has been relatively good, with no major malfunctions. So what the hell am I whining about? I guess I just really want to know where that path is going. Hopefully, it will digress through a poppy field, and I'll get a good night's sleep or two out of it.

In "A Christmas Carol," when the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come visits, Ebenezer Scrooge is frightened and says that he dreads this ghost most of all. None of us really want to know where we'll wind up down the road, even though we say we would love to know where we'll be. But Scrooge also realizes that if he changes, he'll alter the crappy vision of his future that shows him dead without anyone caring. Which leads me back to where I started. It's all about our decisions that put the curves and the forks in the path of fate. If I had been more careful, I might have been dating that nice girl I met in Target. If I had taken a different career path, I might be driving a Hummer and sipping Cristal from a strippers thong. (Although, I can't imagine what decision I would have made to lead me to become a rapper.) Maybe, just maybe, where I am now is exactly where I'm supposed to be and I'm not to complain. Just don't depart from the path and I won't have a gang of rogues selling my clothes off when I'm dead and gone, as they did to old Scrooge.

This is all a bit too much for my feeble, soon-to-be 45-year-old brain can handle. I think I need to take my Metamucil and get some sleep. Fate will be there when I wake up, and at least I'll be well-rested enough to figure out which fork to eat with, let alone to take in my life's destiny. Why couldn't I just get a fortune that said "He who farts in church sits in his own pew." That, I understand completely.