I’m Still Chasing Dreams

Series: Willie Knows
Three Willie Nelson songs, three different ways of looking at getting older.

[1. Funny How Time Slips Away] • [2. Nothing I Can Do About It Now] • [3. I’m Still Chasing Dreams]

Part 3 of 3: Getting older hasn’t stopped me from wondering what’s around the next corner.

The Years Changed. Curiosity Didn’t.

The Guy in the Mirror

Every once in a while, I catch an old man in my mirror.

The strange thing is, I don’t feel like him.

I know the face. I recognize the eyes. I know every wrinkle—mostly because I had a hand in creating them.

But sometimes I look at that guy and think:

When the hell did you get here?

This morning, I heard a song that put words to that feeling.

It was about looking in the mirror and being surprised by the man looking back.

I knew exactly what he meant.

Because in my mind, I’m still the kid who had more ideas than good sense.

I’m still the guy who thinks:

I wonder if I could do that.

And I think that’s probably the biggest thing I’ve learned about myself over the years.

I’m a dream chaser.

Not the kind you read about on motivational posters.

I’ve never been particularly interested in climbing some imaginary mountain so I can stand on top with my arms raised while somebody takes my picture.

My dreams have always been a little more ordinary.

And probably a lot more fun.

I wanted to see what was around the next corner.

I wanted to know how things worked.

I wanted to fix things.

Build things.

Go places I’d never been.

Try things I’d never tried.

And every once in a while, I wanted to do something that made absolutely no sense to anybody but me.

I suppose that explains a lot about my life.

The Kid Never Really Left

I’ve changed jobs.

Changed states.

Bought houses.

Sold houses.

Remodeled houses.

Torn things apart that probably should have been left alone.

I’ve spent countless hours standing in a hardware store staring at something and thinking:

Surely I can figure this out.

Sometimes I did.

Sometimes I learned a whole new definition of the word damages.

I’ve traveled.

I’ve ridden my bicycle across Ohio—not once, but twice—for the American Cancer Society.

I’ve retired.

And retirement, I’ve discovered, didn’t turn me into the guy sitting in a recliner watching the world go by.

If anything, it gave the kid inside me more room to run around.

That’s something I didn’t expect.

For most of my working life, there was always somewhere I had to be.

A meeting.

A deadline.

A problem.

A responsibility.

Somebody needed something.

And I don’t regret any of it.

But when I finally stepped away from work, I discovered something interesting.

I wasn’t tired of doing things.

I was tired of doing things because somebody else had decided they needed to be done.

There’s a difference.

Now I get to wake up and ask a different question:

What do I want to do today?

Sometimes the answer is:

Let’s tear out a bathroom.

Which, in retrospect, raises some questions about my definition of retirement.

Sometimes it’s travel.

Sometimes it’s learning something completely unrelated to anything I knew yesterday.

Sometimes it’s sitting on the porch with a cup of coffee and thinking about what’s next.

And sometimes it’s writing.

That one still surprises me.

I’m a Generalist. Apparently.

I’ve spent most of my life talking.

I’ve never had much trouble finding something to say.

But writing these confessions has done something I didn’t expect.

It’s made me listen to myself.

I’ve started seeing patterns.

I’ve realized I’ve always been curious.

I’ve always been restless.

I’ve always wanted to know what was around the next corner.

I’ve never been very good at saying:

“Well, that’s enough. I know everything I need to know.”

That’s probably why I call myself a generalist.

One day it’s investments.

The next it’s home renovation.

Then economics.

A mechanical problem.

A project down the road.

Or some obscure question nobody in their right mind would spend three hours researching.

But I will.

Because I want to know.

And I think I’ve finally figured out why.

I’m not really chasing answers.
I’m chasing the next question.

Maybe that’s what I’ve been doing all my life.

Sixty-Four Came Up Fast

That’s what the song made me think about.

There’s a line about time disappearing right before your eyes.

Boy, does it.

I can remember being young and thinking sixty-four was ancient.

Sixty-four?

That was somebody else’s age.

That was the guy sitting on the front porch telling you about how things used to be.

Now I’m that guy.

Except I don’t feel like him.

That’s the funny thing about getting older.

You don’t wake up one morning and suddenly become old.

It happens in pieces.

One day you realize the years have gotten away from you.

One day you notice the music you grew up with is now being called “classic.”

One day somebody younger than you calls you sir.

That’s when you know things have gone too far.

But here’s what I didn’t expect.

Getting older hasn’t made me less curious.

If anything, it has made me more interested in what comes next.

I still have things I want to do.

Places I want to see.

Projects I want to tackle.

Things I want to learn.

Stories I want to tell.

At twenty, maybe the dream is becoming somebody.

At forty, maybe it’s building something.

At sixty-four, maybe it’s having the freedom to decide what you’re going to do with Tuesday morning.

I like that dream.

It’s manageable.

And I’m pretty good at it.

The Dreams Changed

There’s another thing in that song that grabbed me.

The idea of doing something because you love doing it—even when you’re not getting paid.

That one hit home.

I’ve spent a good portion of my life doing things simply because I wanted to.

Helping somebody.

Fixing something.

Taking on a project.

Learning a skill.

Going somewhere.

Writing something.

Riding a bicycle hundreds of miles for a cause.

Nobody had to pay me.

I didn’t need anybody to tell me it was a good idea.

I just wanted to do it.

Maybe that’s what being a dream chaser really means.

It doesn’t necessarily mean you have some grand plan.

It means you haven’t lost the ability to get excited about something that hasn’t happened yet.

That’s a pretty good definition of hope, if you ask me.

And maybe that’s why this song found me at the right time.

Because lately I’ve been thinking more about time.

Not in a morbid way.

Just realistically.

The clock doesn’t care if I’m ready.

It doesn’t care if I still have things on my list.

It doesn’t care if I’ve finally figured everything out.

It just ticks.

I’m Not Done Yet

So I’m trying not to waste too much of it worrying about the guy in the mirror.

He’s older.

That’s obvious.

But he’s also still curious.

Still stubborn.

Still willing to try something new.

Still capable of looking at a problem and saying:

I bet I can figure that out.

And every once in a while, he still does something that makes the younger version of me proud.

That’s enough for me.

Maybe that’s what the mirror is really showing me.

Not what I’ve lost.

What I’ve accumulated.

The gray hair.

The wrinkles.

The scars.

The memories.

The mistakes.

The lessons.

The people.

The miles.

The houses.

The adventures.

The things that worked.

The things that didn’t.

All of it.

You don’t get to keep the years.

But you get to keep what the years taught you.

And somewhere along the way, I think I’ve learned something pretty important:

Dreams don’t necessarily disappear when you get older.
They change.

Maybe that’s the real reason I don’t recognize the old man in the mirror.

I’m looking for the wrong guy.

I’m looking for the young man I used to be.

But he’s not standing behind the glass.

He’s standing right here.

He’s the one still asking questions.

Still tearing things apart.

Still traveling.

Still learning.

Still writing.

Still wondering what’s around the next corner.

He’s the one who still hears a song and thinks:

That’s me.

So these days, when I look in the mirror, I don’t worry quite so much about the gray hair or the wrinkles.

I’ve earned every one of them.

What I look for is that kid.

The one with the crazy ideas.

The one who still wants to know what’s next.

He’s usually there.

And when I catch him looking back at me, I know I’m not done yet.

So I guess I’ll keep chasing dreams.

Lord knows I’ve chased worse things.

🎵 These three songs started all of this:
[Listen to the "Lenny's Confessions: Willie Knows" playlist on Spotify]

Series: Willie Knows
[1. Funny How Time Slips Away] • [2. Nothing I Can Do About It Now] • [3. I’m Still Chasing Dreams]