OPINION:
I’m 62 years young today.
My birthday present to myself is chasing white-tailed deer in the Texas Hill Country with family and friends. For the Nugent family, fast food is a running herbivore.
At 62, my piss-and-vinegar tank continues to overflow with unlimited energy. One of these decades, I’m going to slow down and relax. Maybe next century. Until then, I have trillions of Texan fire ants to kill; guitars to brutalize; dogs to wear out; trees to plant; grandchildren to teach to hunt, fish, trap and shoot; wood to chop; killer songs, articles and books to write; politicians to throttle; interviews to conduct; and television shows to film and edit. Then I’ll have breakfast.
You can’t have 62 gung-ho birthday parties by poisoning your sacred temple and God-given senses. At 62, I remain clean and sober, and my ponytail remains erect. Witnessing way too many of my musical heroes and band mates poison their bodies and assume room temperature reinforced in me at an early age that drooling, puking and dying do not a party make.
God has truly blessed me. I’m healthy; I have a loving and adorable family, great hunting dogs, a gravity-defying musical career; and, most important, fuzzy-headed idiots hate me. Perfect. What more could a guy possibly want? I have self-actualized. Pardon me whilst I adjust my glowing halo.
With the exception of celebrating the abundant love of my family, the most rewarding thing ever to have happened to me has been the moving time I have spent with brave warriors of the U.S. military blazing away with various weapons, hunting or just humping guitars into submission. Spending time with these heroes deeply stirs my soul and adds fuel to my roaring, red-hot, internal all-American activist drive. How dare I not use to the best of my ability the freedoms and American dream provided by the incalculable sacrifices of U.S. military warriors? How dare we not, indeed.
If that’s not enough to keep a guy motivated to make America a better place in which to live, work and play, I’m further blessed beyond words to have terminally ill children request to spend time with me at sacred hunting campfires as their last wish in life. With a lump in my throat and often misty-eyed, I make sure these amazing and wonderful kids have a day when their disease has to take a back seat to a soul-cleansing day of outrageous, over-the-top, gonzo fun. We play with spirit fire.
Trust me, it isn’t the guy who goes out with the most toys or who plays 6,100 greasy Motown-inspired concerts who wins. It’s all about making human connections and giving back.
A word of warning to idiots: Trust me, I won’t go away. I’m turning up the heat and shining a blazing light on lethargic, lazy, soulless, booger-eating bureaucratic cockroaches who accept the ugly status quo, spit in the face of common sense and genuflect at the altar of dumb. You will not win; I will.
Firing corrupt employees and repealing counterproductive laws, regulations and rules that only harm the very people they claim to protect is the focus of my life. I refuse to suffer fools and political-correctness addicts. If their house gets in my way, I’ll burn it down. Don’t tread on me, and I won’t Ted on you.
I’m going to become more demonstrative, more committed, more focused and more determined. Just like my heroes Rosa Parks and U.S. Marine Corps Devil Dog Chesty Puller, I will never retreat, never back down, never surrender and never give up. Instead, my Great Spirit battering ram will smash into the wall of idiocy until I obliterate it. Let’s get it on.
At the tender young age of 62, I’ve got life by the short hairs. I’m a free man on a mission to live constantly at the tip of the spear in the arena of life where the dust swirls. That’s where the action is and where you will forever find me swinging a crowbar of truth, logic and common sense. Join me. It’s a target-rich environment.
Happy birthday to me. Here we go again for yet another year of the ultimate experiment in self-government. I’m drunk on freedom, again.
Ted Nugent is an American rock ’n’ roll, sporting and political activist icon. He is the author of “Ted, White and Blue: The Nugent Manifesto” and “God, Guns & Rock ’N’ Roll” (Regnery Publishing).
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