Growing Up is Weird. One day you're 15, Meeting people who will be important to you for the next decade. Next you're heading off to college, head in the clouds and full of ideals and expectations, sure of your path in life. Then you're 25, having achieved few of your goals, still in the same job, same house, virtually the same place you've been for the last four years.
Life moved on and you didn't.
Or so it feels...
Because at the same time you're making decisions that'll impact the rest of your life and leave your head spinning with questions.
"Should I go back to school?" "Do I need to start a retirement account?"
"What if I stop renting and buy a house?"
"What do I do about health insurance?"
"Should I focus on dating? Do I have time to?"
"How can I make time for my friends and hobbies when I'm exhausted after work?"
"How do I manage my mental health?"
You're choosing your path in life. You're figuring out how to be an adult with no framework, no step by step tutorial, no neatly packaged YouTube series detailing everything you need to know, and no one to really show you the way.
I mean sure, people can tell you bits and pieces, your boss helps you plan a budget and investments, your dad tells you about coming weather and events, you watch the 'Real Adults' in your life for clues on how to piece it all together but it's still a struggle.
Because life keeps coming and coming and coming.
It feels like last month was January and now its September, the weeks fly when you're holding all the pieces of your life in an overflowing hand, bits and pieces falling through the gaps, (I was supposed to get a physical months ago. My breaks need replacing. I need to renew my license, my passport.) Time just keeps slipping away. Life comes fast.
Still, what can you do? Not make it work? Fall apart? Fade to apathy?
Don't get me wrong some days I get the appeal. To have no worries, no stress, no bills, no decisions. I Get It.
It sounds bleak, and that's before we address the general stress about the future of society and our world. But also...
Life's pretty good.
I'm renting a nice place. It has it's problems (the sunroom floods when it rains, there's mold in my bathroom, the kitchen's small, and the whole house it tile) but it's close to my job, decorated nicely, rent is split with my brother and his girlfriend (we get along well), there's a big yard and a garden, and plenty or room for our three cats.
My Job is fine. It's not quite where I want to be, seeing as I worked there in high school, but I'm a chef now. Making decent money, cooking and managing people. I get along with most of my coworkers and I enjoy it, despite how physically taxing it is (I walk 4-5 miles on a slow day at work, and it's been 95° in the kitchen all week).
I'm going back to college in January, Software Engineering, which is stressful enough considering the current job market, but I enjoy coding, am decent at it, and even the lowest paying positions are more than I'm making now.
I have hobbies, I make videos, I write, I game (I've been particularly obsessed with The Legend of Zelda Lately). I keep my self occupied, satiated.
I cuddle with my cat (a cute little black kitten, four months old) at night and call him a bastard when he bites my fingers.
I'm not dating but I see my best friends often, the two people in the world who I click with like no others, who have been by my side for a decade now. There's love there, not the same of course, platonic rather than romantic. That doesn't change the strength of it, overflowing, spilling out of my hands like water.
So there's good and bad, pros and cons, but that's life I suppose.
I read a quote somewhere once, where though long forgotten.
It goes something like, "You can't change yesterday, only what you'll do tomorrow."
It resonates, there's a weight to it I like, at the risk of sounding maudlin. You can influence who you'll be, what you'll do. You simply have to act.
Which brings us to this blog. It's purpose. The Reason.
The whole reason I'm sitting here in my underwear, 700ish words into what frankly amounts to an embarrassingly public diary entry.
There's no blueprint to life. I've had to do my own research. So I thought I'd make one.
Consider this a chronicle of young adulthood. Public introspection interspersed with personal experiences and answers to the questions I ask myself. And maybe if y'all are particularly unlucky a rant or two on whatever media is capturing my attention that month.
I plan to write guide-like articles for problems I tackle in my own life, partly to put my thoughts to paper (or the screen) and partly to help any others who have the same problems.
I also plan to write some more long rambly posts like this one, detailing my thoughts, motivations, and frustrations.
What's the end goal?
I'm not sure.
I didn't plan to do this. This Idea came together in the space of a slow afternoon at work. I'm writing this less than 30 minutes after I've come home.
My first goal is to write at least one post a week for six months.
After that, we'll have to see.
I'll probably monetize this blog in some way if it gets enough traffic. Rent's hard enough even with a steady job so there's no point in passing up free cash.
If you have anything you'd like me to write about, feel free to message me, I can't promise to respond but I'll at least read it.
I hope you've enjoyed the mess, and I'll see you next time.
Until then.
-Chris
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