Age is a never changing fact of life
It will never stop.
And
I really don't want it to.
When you climb a rock wall, you feel a kind of pride.
The type that seeps into your bones
That's what aging feels like.
The awe of new times, the need to rest when it gets too hard for a while.
Being able to find yourself and to be comfortable with it.
Even if it's not permanent
Amazement at ideas
The idea of independence
The idea of driving your own car
The idea of getting a credit card to balance
At seventeen feeling elation at being so close to the top.
You can feel your pulse thumping in your ears
Then
Then you've reached the top.
The air is clear
The view, pretty
‘You're in one piece, you made it’ 
But
The air is still as clear as it was before
The view just at a different angle now.
No less pretty
just different.
A birthday is here and you're given a new number
But the number has weight, and you have to get back down the mountain you scaled
To cross a valley and climb an even taller one
To climb and work for it
Work for your independence
Work for that car you want to drive
Work for money to put on that credit card.
White knuckling ledges and heart racing
‘You can handle this!'
The climb down is much like the way up.
Just add new steps to it
‘You are eighteen now, you should know where you're going in life’
For life
Time will keep going
Meandering passed and making new rocks crop up
Rocks you'll have to work over
Age will always affect life
The entire time feeling pride in the work you put into it.