Maybe Your Time Is Now

What life, loss, friendship, and going back to school taught me about believing there is still time

By Barry Frye

We hear those four simple words all the time: It’s never too late. But do we really believe them? Or, somewhere along the way, do we start believing something else instead?

You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.

For a long time, I think I believed the second one.

Like most people, I had plans when I was younger. Things I wanted to accomplish. Places I wanted to go. Goals I assumed I would eventually get around to pursuing.

Then life happened.

First came marriage. Then came children. Suddenly, life wasn’t just about what I wanted anymore. I was responsible for other people, and those responsibilities mattered to me. I wanted to be involved in my children’s lives, so I coached sports. I worked. I provided. I did the things that needed to be done.

There was always tomorrow for everything else.

Tomorrow I could travel. Tomorrow I could go back to school. Tomorrow I could do some of those things I had always wanted to do.

The problem with tomorrow is that it has a habit of becoming next week, next year, and eventually, someday.

Before I knew it, years had passed, and I began to accept the idea that maybe I had simply missed my time.

After all, you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.

Right?

Then life happened again.

I was diagnosed with stage four cancer.

Suddenly, tomorrow wasn’t something I could automatically assume would be there. Facing an uncertain future has a way of changing your perspective.

I found myself taking a long look back over my life, and I saw a lot of work. Twelve-hour days. Seven days a week. Work had monopolized much of my life.

I also saw missed opportunities. Things I wanted to do but hadn’t done. Places I wanted to see but hadn’t seen. Goals I had put off because there was always supposed to be more time.

After twelve hours of surgery and weeks of recovery, I made myself a promise. My life was going to have more balance. I had been given another chance, and I wasn’t going to spend all of it working.

But life had another plan.

The very day I was released to return to work, after being out for almost a year, my wife suffered a massive stroke that left her paralyzed.

Everything changed again.

My priority became being her caregiver, and for the next year and a half, that was my life. Then she passed away.

At 56 years old, I found myself trying to figure out what came next. I convinced myself that between my age and my medical history, nobody was going to want to hire me. So I became a food delivery driver and once again found myself working long hours.

But something was different this time.

I remembered that look back over my life and all those things I had put off.

Somewhere along the way, I came up with a sentence that became my personal slogan:

“I’m gonna live while I’m alive.”

I made a post on Facebook and started listing the things I wanted to do. My bucket list. Places I wanted to see. Experiences I wanted to have. Things I wanted to accomplish.

Writing them down made them feel different. They weren’t just ideas anymore. They were goals.

So I put faith into action.

I went to the Post Office and applied for a passport.

I didn’t have an international trip booked. I just figured if I had the passport, the only thing left to do was use it.

Around that time, my dear friend Lisa saw my Facebook post. She was going to Pennsylvania for her brother’s funeral, and I went along to help her drive.

Before we left, she asked me a strange question.

“Do you have a passport?”

Well, yes. As a matter of fact, I did.

She told me to bring it.

Now, in the interest of complete transparency, geography has never been my strongest subject. But I was fairly certain Pennsylvania was still part of the United States and I wouldn’t need a passport to get there.

Still, I packed it.

After the funeral, Lisa asked if I had remembered my passport. I finally had to ask the obvious question.

Why in the world did I need a passport in Pennsylvania?

She had read my Facebook post. She had seen my bucket list. And we were only about 100 miles from Niagara Falls.

We were going to mark one off the list.

So we did.

Seeing Niagara Falls for the first time was amazing. We crossed to the Canadian side, and that passport got its first stamp. Something I had written on a Facebook bucket list was suddenly real.

One down.

On the drive home, we started talking about another item on my list: taking a cruise. So we planned one. That October, during my birthday week, we went.

But apparently simply taking a cruise wasn’t enough. We arrived in Orlando early and went to Disney too.

Two more off the list.

There was one item, though, that wasn’t as simple as buying a ticket or packing a suitcase.

It was probably the one I regretted most.

I had never finished college.

Lisa, who I jokingly call a professional student, started telling me I should go back to school.

My response was immediate.

“I’m too old. It’s too late.”

I had been out of school for 33 years. Thirty-three years! Things had changed just a little since the last time I had been in a classroom.

Could I still do the work? Could I keep up with students closer to my children’s age than mine?

And maybe the biggest question of all:

Was I still smart enough to do this?

Lisa kept encouraging me and believing in me when I wasn’t completely sure I believed in myself.

Eventually, I decided to try one class at the local community college.

Not a degree or some grand multi-year educational plan.

One class.

I could do one class.

And I did.

One class became two. Two became three. With each class, the fear started disappearing. The old-dog argument didn’t seem quite as convincing anymore.

Maybe I hadn’t missed my opportunity.

Maybe my timeline simply looked different from someone else’s.

Eventually, Lisa and I started talking about what I was really trying to accomplish. If I was going to do this, why stop with an associate degree? Why not go for the bachelor’s degree I had always regretted not finishing?

So that became the new goal.

I needed an online program that would allow me to continue working while going to school. We researched the options and found the one that felt right for me: Liberty University.

I applied, and I was accepted.

Today, I’m in my junior year, working full time and attending college full time, with plans to graduate in 2027.

That is a sentence the 56-year-old version of me probably wouldn’t have believed.

I’m not nervous about school anymore. I’m not wondering whether I belong there. I’m not asking whether I’m too old.

I know the answer.

I’m not.

Looking back, I realize I misunderstood what “It’s never too late” actually means.

It doesn’t mean there are no consequences to waiting. There are.

It doesn’t mean life will suddenly become easy or everything will happen according to our plans. If my life has taught me anything, it is that plans can change in an instant.

What it means to me is much simpler.

As long as I’m here, there is still something I can do with today.

I can’t reclaim all the hours I spent working. I can’t change the things that happened. I can’t make myself 25 again, and I’m not particularly interested in trying.

But I can decide what I do with the time in front of me.

Sometimes that means getting a passport before you have anywhere to go.

Sometimes it means saying yes when your friend tells you to bring it to Pennsylvania for reasons that make absolutely no sense.

Sometimes it means standing beside Niagara Falls and realizing something you thought you might never see is right in front of you.

And sometimes it means walking into a classroom, even a virtual one, after 33 years and discovering that the old dog can learn just fine.

I still live by the words I wrote after one of the hardest chapters of my life:

“I’m gonna live while I’m alive.”

None of us knows how much time we have.

This became painfully clear to me again this year when I received a call informing me that my 27-year-old son had been killed in an auto accident.

But maybe that isn’t a reason to be afraid of what’s left.

Maybe it’s a reason to use it.

So what is the thing you’ve been putting off?

Changing professions? Starting a hobby? Taking the trip? Going back to school? Doing something you’ve quietly wanted to do for years but convinced yourself your opportunity had passed?

The first step really is the hardest.

After that, it’s one foot in front of the other.

One class. One trip. One application. One yes.

Eventually, you get to turn around and see something you couldn’t see when you started:

A whole line of accomplishments behind you.

Maybe you haven’t missed your time.

Maybe your time is now.