OK, seriously: whose ass do I have to kick for speeding up time to the point that a year now passes in the span of what seems like a few weeks? Because I’m really not digging it.

Last year, I wrote that I felt like 40 was coming over the horizon too quickly for my liking. It’s looming a lot larger now (though, I must say, turning 36 was more of a shock to my system; passing the halfway point of my 30s rattled my cage).

I have found that reframing reality to my own specifications often makes me feel a whole lot better about things, so I decided yesterday that 40 is the new 30.

I remember thinking that the ABC television series “thirtysomething” was about old people. Very old people.

I recently had to select my 10 favorite albums of 2006 for our annual year-end wrap-up at LiveDaily. Much to my surprise, I ended up settling on John Mayer’s “Continuum” as my No. 1 pick. Musically, it’s terrific … which, in and of itself, was not enough to earn it top billing; Mayer’s lyrics sealed the deal.

I don’t know if I’ve ever identified so much with, or been so moved by, a set of lyrics as I am by the “Continuum” cut “Stop This Train,” which chokes me up every time I listen to it, and seems particularly relevant as I close the book on yet another all-too-quickly gone year of my life (granted, it’s a lot less moving sans-music and in cold, black-and-white pixels, but hopefully you’ll get the idea):

No, I’m not colorblind
I know the world is black and white
I try to keep an open mind
But I just can’t sleep on this tonight

Stop this train
I want to get off
And go home again
I can’t take the speed it’s moving in
I know I can’t
But honestly, won’t someone stop this train?

Don’t know how else to say it
Don’t want to see my parents go
One generation’s length away
From fighting life out on my own

Stop this train
I want to get off
And go home again
I can’t take the speed it’s moving in
I know I can’t
But honestly, won’t someone stop this train?

So scared of getting older
I’m only good at being young
So I play the numbers game
To find a way to say that life has just begun

Had a talk with my old man
Said “Help me understand”
He said, “Turn sixty-eight
You’ll re-negotiate”

“Don’t stop this train
Don’t for a minute change the place you’re in
Don’t think I couldn’t ever understand
I tried my hand
John, honestly we’ll never stop this train”

Once in awhile, when it’s good
It’ll feel like it should
And they’re all still around
And you’re still safe and sound
And you don’t miss a thing
Till you cry when you’re driving away in the dark
Singing,

Stop this train
I want to get off
And go home again
I can’t take the speed it’s moving in
I know I can’t
Cause now I see I will never stop this train

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