ripening

yesterday was my 25th birthday. it's a wierd feeling, turning a quarter century old. with this in mind, i spent this morning contemplating where i am at in life.
not only am i 25 years old, i am an uncle to an awesome 3 year old nephew. i have been married for two and a half years to my beautiful wife and my first child is due to be born this coming in april. i was born south of boston and now live east of orlando. i wanted to be a pilot when i was 10 and today i play music and work in a corporate office.
i'm ripening. that's what i arrived on today.
i remember watching mom's tomatoes grow in her little garden; complete with marigolds to ward off the maurading ant armies. the tomatoes would arrive on the vine tiny and green (one time i tried to eat one and i will never try that again!) and over the course of several days, their shade would slowly progress from green to yellow and from yellow to red. i used to get impatient waiting for them to be ripe; wondering why they didnt just emerge as ready-to-eat tomatoes just waiting to be placed on a salad. but just as any life on earth takes time to mature, those tiny green tomatoes needed time to develop and ripen before they were ready to be used.
i'm ripening. 25 years ago, i arrived; a tiny green bud on a vine. i wasn't ready to fall in love or dream about being a pilot, i was crying and cold and missing my mother's womb. i had a long way to go cus it takes time to ripen. 15 years ago, watching jet contrails stream overhead, wondering what being in a cloud was like; the greenish hue began to slowly give away to yellow. 10 years ago, dealing with teen age awkwardness, i didnt notice the faint red spots beginning to show in all the yellow and green. and i kept on ripening...
i think that yesterday, though, was the day i noticed just how much red is really showing...