I didn’t have to grow up

Some say you need to graciously give up the things of youth and pass into adulthood. As I’m somehow approaching my mid-30’s, I think I’ve managed to gain a little maturity over the years.

However, instead of giving up things that mattered most to me as a kid, I recently realized I sort of allowed them to inform my career choices. I am living 4th grade Tim’s dream. When I was 9, I loved riding my bike, and building forts in the woods.

I didn’t have to discard these passions, or cram them into a weekend hobby. Somehow, I figured out how to get people to pay me to do them.

Since 2013 I’ve been cutting up the streets of St. Louis delivering food for Food Pedaler. It’s like a scavenger hunt where I get paid to ride my bike as fast as I can. This ties into a favorite past time of bumming around malls, strip malls, and parks. Pedaling, when not on a rush, is basically professional loitering.

As a child, I would watch ants for hours upon hours. One time, I dammed a creek and created a small pond. My brother and I built a drawbridge over another creek to lead to one of our forts. I planted my first garden when I was 6, popcorn and tomatoes. And I loved watching things decay — natural processes have always fascinated me. Beginning last year, my wife and I launched our urban farm and residential composting service, Perennial City. Every day, I get to wake up, and go play in the dirt. I imagine things and build them (and now I have a screw gun). I amass and repurpose big piles of carbonaceous material, orchestrate a flock of birds to transform food scraps into gardens, and am building our very own forest.

Maybe growing up successfully is knowing what makes you tick, and finding out how to make that useful to others.