7 Truths After 42 Years of Living

Benjamin Sledge
6 min readJul 29, 2023
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In 1989, I was eight years old and played on a soccer team named “Stars & Stripes.” Cold War fever was still in full swing despite us not knowing the war was in its final years, hence my soccer team’s name. Back then, we were proud to buy American. If you yelled “Wolverines!” it was mutually understood the commies sucked. Hell… I rocked a flat-top because it was the quintessential American men’s hair fashion at the time.

Need proof? Here ya go.

At age 8, were I to give you life advice, it would have revolved around my experience then—girls have cooties and collecting comic books will one day make you a millionaire. In my teens? Well, we can consult my yearbook, which would amount to wanting to marry some cheerleader, being your badass yourself, and Limp Bizkit ruling forever. By my 30s, you’d get more sage and sound advice, but my predictions about the future and things I’d assume would happen would be way off. The same is true in my 40s, and I feel I know even less. With age, however, you temper, and often reflect on the timeless truths that have permeated your youth and later years. You recognize you no longer know what the future holds, but keenly grasp wisdom that has permeated time since the ancients.

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Benjamin Sledge
Benjamin Sledge

Written by Benjamin Sledge

Multi-award winning author | Combat wounded veteran | Mental health specialist | Occasional geopolitical intel | Graphic designer | https://benjaminsledge.com