In my mind, that is probably the most memorable quote from the 1970 film, Boys in the Band. It was spoken by the character Michael as he was relating his dying father's last words.
I first saw the film during my senior year in high school. I went with my then-"girlfriend," Jean. Not really having any media representations of gay life at the time, Boys in the Band—as bleak and depressing as it was—did offer a glimpse into at least some aspect of the life I was taking my first, tentative steps into—if only as a warning of what not to become. (I returned for a second screening on my own a week later, and Jean's response was, "Why?!")
But I digress.
As I've grown older, those words have rung more true with each passing year.
When I was in my 20s and 30s, I thought had it all figured out. I knew how life worked—even if it didn't always work out the way I intended. The cracks started appearing in that belief as I entered my 40s, and when cancer came out of nowhere and hit me up the side of the head mid-decade, I realized I didn't know shit.
When you're twenty-one, life is a roadmap. It's only when you get to be twenty-five or so that you begin to suspect you've been looking at the map upside down, and not until you're forty are you entirely sure. By the time you're sixty, take it from me, you're…lost." ~ Stephen King
Guess I'm not the only one…