I see you

So, yes, I turned 50 this last week.

The thing is (and everyone says something like this) I feel like a kid inside. I mean, at the risk of being too vulnerable, I have the same insecurities, the same marvels, even some of the same social constructs I had as a kid. This, of course, makes me wonder...

Does that all important public leader still feel (like I do sometimes) that he is just fooling everyone, that he's not really all that important or empowered? This happens to me sometimes in every role from teacher to parent, from good citizen being wrongfully pulled over to man moving peers to be better servant-leaders. Underneath it all, I'm still wondering if they like my kewl shirt, man.

Does that intimidating clerk, that authoritative banker, that omniscient doctor, that brilliant researcher--fret over whether people like them? Do such people fuss with their smile in the mirror and get all anxious over a little zit? Do they try to hide farts? Do they fantasize they are Indiana Jones?

Sometimes (just for a split second) I think I can see through the veneer, the mask, and identify the wee person inside who is just as sensitive as my pre-teen self. We are on opposite sides of a big desk, both of us suited in our meet-the-attorney fatigues, both of us frowning just-so at the paperwork between us...but I catch a glimpse of a kid who loved Spaghetti-O's and comic books and racing a bicycle through puddles. I see a wounded spirit just wanting to be good pals, if only we didn't have to work and pay bills and pretend to be all grown up. On the inside he's saying, "I think you're hair's cool." On the outside, tapping his pen on the foreclosure forms, raising a practiced eyebrow, he's saying, "The confluence of your amortization matrix suggests imminent capitulation of all fiscal holdings."

I just want to say, "I see you. I have a frog in my pocket. I like girls because they taste like cotton candy."

Mmmmmmmmmmmmm. Cotton Candy!