My Mid-Life Crisis: How did I attempt to regain my lost youth?

What did it take me to get over my mid-life crisis in my early forties?

Maybe the whole world was not aware that I was having a mid-life crisis but I certainly did. I was forced to confront the fact whether life was slipping me by when I received an invitation to the 25th Reunion of the 1971 Matrics of the Alexander Road High School in Port Elizabeth.

Up until that point I would have rated my Personal Satisfaction Index as fair to good. I would never have rated it is as excellent because intrinsically I realised that I could have done better. That feeling was certainly more visceral than intellectual. But now I was forced to confront the issue from a practical point of view rather than in some indecisive way.

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A Running Experience: A Hill too Far

On this day, the Loskop 50km ultramarathon running race had one hill too many, Faraday’s Hill. It was to be my nemesis.

Prologue

A Bridge Too Far is a 1977 War film based on the 1974 “A Bridge Too Far” book of the same name by Cornelius Ryan and directed by Richard Attenborough, brother of David Attenborough.

The film tells the story of the failure of Operation Market Garden during World War II, the Allied attempt to break through German lines and seize several bridges in the occupied Netherlands, including one at Arnhem, with the main objective of outflanking German defences.

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The First Time

Even 30 years later one can remember every detail, every nuance, every careless whisper. Despite the intervening years, all the feelings & emotions are remembered as if they were yesterday.The first time that your eyes met hers, the first surreptitious kiss. They are engraved in one’s mind never to be forgotten.

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