I have exactly two years and ten days to physically and mentally prepare for my own personal golden jubilee. When I reflect on Golden Jubilees, (even the term sounds antiquated and passé) the only one I have any recollection of celebrating was that of my primary school (circa 1979). I recall we dressed up like extras from Little House on The Prairie and danced around a maypole … seemed logical at the time and goes to reinforce that 50 years ago (from any point in time) just falls into that nebulous period affectionately referred to as “the olden days.”

I’ve been trying to convince myself that this is just another birthday … but who am I kidding? I’m going to be half a century old! That sounds more like the description of a sedimentary rock formation than an occasion worthy of celebration. I’m frantically searching for something positive, but even the mantra for the decade ahead is dull. “Dirty thirties” … “Naughty forties” … “Nifty fifties” … Nifty. Really? Is that all I have to look forward to? “Nifty” sounds about as sexy as a poop in a pool. I think the thing about 50 is that it’s like the ‘ref of life’ has blown the whistle on half time. We are forced to face up to our own mortality and reflect on what we’ve achieved so far and what we still want to do.

My heyday has been replaced by my mayday and a newfound sense of urgency attached to ticking things off my bucket list. My head is spinning with “What ifs” and “What’s nexts” and with that in mind I’m formulating a plan (more on that later) … with the first objective being to verbalise all these crazy thoughts in my head into words. To me writing is like therapy (just cheaper) and god knows I’m going to need plenty of that over the next 740 days.