Ahead of Schedule
The summer before my junior year of high school, I decided to keep a journal of what I did every day. I was tired of that horrible feeling on the night before school started when you looked back and thought: “fuck, I wasted a whole summer.” So, every night I wrote down what happened that day: big or small.
To some extent, it worked. I read through the journal the night before school and saw not waste, but days full of experience: a summer internship at the National Institute of Health, my first time smoking weed, my first girlfriend, who decided because we went to different schools that we should only be a summer fling. Don’t worry, it was fine. I only cried a lot.Having found the exercise to have eased my anxiety, I kept it up every summer until I graduated college; – a fact I had forgotten until I reopened the journal to write this piece. The journal stops abruptly, perhaps aptly, on the day I moved to LA. What lay ahead was the never-ending “school year” of life. “Summer breaks” were done.
I’ve been anxious about the future since I was very young. I was one of those kids that you call precocious to avoid saying “annoying as shit.” Like most people who have probed their faults, I blame my parents. From a very young age they were determined to make sure that my siblings and I not only succeeded but excelled. We were bright and hardworking. And with that came a responsibility to do extraordinary things. Alongside the family pictures in our apartment were images of Nelson Mandela, Malcom X, Sugar Ray Leonard, and a Charlie Brown comic strip where Linus laments “There’s no heavier burden than a great potential.” Effective. But not subtle.
As it turns out, being deeply, intensely concerned about living up to your promise keeps you very anxiously focused on the future. Especially in entertainment, which, as I like to say, is just a clout industry that makes content on the side. It’s ALL about looking ahead to what will happen months or even years down the line. But being aware of a problem is different from fixing it. Instead, I just get anxious about being anxious.
By many measures, my life is “ahead of schedule.” Despite the major disruptions the entertainment industry has faced, I’ve been fortunate enough to write for multiple TV shows and am now branching out into my own projects in TV, film, and theater. I’m in a relationship that’s lasted for over eight years. And while I constantly reflect on how thankful I am for all of the above, I still find it difficult to take the proper time to relax and enjoy them. Even retirement, even as a hypothetical still decades away, feels somehow off the table. I can imagine switching the kind or frequency of work that I do, but I don’t know if I could accept a state of “not working.” There’s always more that I can, and should, be doing.
Fortunately, I don’t only feel anxious when I look ahead.. It may be scary and all my hopes and dreams and plans may come crashing down in spectacular fashion, but at least it’s not set. The future can still be shaped and changed. Whereas, the present often feels like a place in which I’m stuck, forced to deal with things as they are. Forced to deal with the future.
I think this anxiety is common for many in our generation, cursed by an inability to fully experience and appreciate the living of our lives,instead desiring to read its wikipedia page. While some of us may be on the brink of some of the biggest decisions of our lives – marriage, jobs, children -- many of us are still just trying to get by. It’s a feeling that permeates our entire generation. We’re delayed, stuck in a never-ending state of adolescence. So why not look ahead to the future, where we can at least imagine that we will feel like we have our shit together? And comfort ourselves in the now with sports gambling, drugs, hours spent on TikTok, whatever keeps us going.
9/11 and the 2008 financial crisis primed our sense of the world; they taught us that nothing is safe. Older millennials grew up with the optimism of the late 80s and early 90s. When the world fell apart in their adulthood, it surprised them. It’s why they’re bitter and self-oriented. Gen-Z came into a world that was already falling apart, which is why some decided to fuck shit up and others pre-gave-up and just get fucked up. But us young millenials, us cuspers if you will, never had the optimism, nor did we have the acceptance. We’re stuck in the horrible, anxious middle ground. We’re stuck helplessly treading water, swim class overachievers. With a desire to do our best, but with no place to go. Aware, always, that someone else is steering the ship.
Of course, thinking about and preparing for the future isn’t bad. It’s important. Especially given that the world is probably going to change in our lifetime more dramatically than maybe any time in the past. But there’s a frivolity to protecting a thing that’s imaginary; a world we want to be small and safe. Life is short. Should I use that short life to journal? Is focusing on all the little details of a day; a summer; a lifetime good for you? Is it presence or is it judgment? You can remember and reflect on moments, big and small, but no matter what, life goes on.
Looking back on my journal now, it’s funny how almost everything I wrote down was so mundane: “Cooked eggs and bacon.” “Baptism at church (yelling baby).” “Gravity bong in Francis’ garage. Got too high, needed to lie down.”
It’s comforting sometimes to realize how boring most days are.
Kris Allen, who you obviously remember was the winner of Season 8 of American Idol, has a song called “Live Like We’re Dying.” I was always obsessed with it because, while it may seem trite, it really is hard to truly grasp that we are all on the path to death. Whether quickly or slowly, we have no idea.. There are places to go, things to do, and people to love and fuck and hate and sometimes all three. We’re all dying. So get to it!
February 22nd 2024
Watched a movie with her then went to bed.
To some extent, it worked. I read through the journal the night before school and saw not waste, but days full of experience: a summer internship at the National Institute of Health, my first time smoking weed, my first girlfriend, who decided because we went to different schools that we should only be a summer fling. Don’t worry, it was fine. I only cried a lot.Having found the exercise to have eased my anxiety, I kept it up every summer until I graduated college; – a fact I had forgotten until I reopened the journal to write this piece. The journal stops abruptly, perhaps aptly, on the day I moved to LA. What lay ahead was the never-ending “school year” of life. “Summer breaks” were done.
I’ve been anxious about the future since I was very young. I was one of those kids that you call precocious to avoid saying “annoying as shit.” Like most people who have probed their faults, I blame my parents. From a very young age they were determined to make sure that my siblings and I not only succeeded but excelled. We were bright and hardworking. And with that came a responsibility to do extraordinary things. Alongside the family pictures in our apartment were images of Nelson Mandela, Malcom X, Sugar Ray Leonard, and a Charlie Brown comic strip where Linus laments “There’s no heavier burden than a great potential.” Effective. But not subtle.
As it turns out, being deeply, intensely concerned about living up to your promise keeps you very anxiously focused on the future. Especially in entertainment, which, as I like to say, is just a clout industry that makes content on the side. It’s ALL about looking ahead to what will happen months or even years down the line. But being aware of a problem is different from fixing it. Instead, I just get anxious about being anxious.
By many measures, my life is “ahead of schedule.” Despite the major disruptions the entertainment industry has faced, I’ve been fortunate enough to write for multiple TV shows and am now branching out into my own projects in TV, film, and theater. I’m in a relationship that’s lasted for over eight years. And while I constantly reflect on how thankful I am for all of the above, I still find it difficult to take the proper time to relax and enjoy them. Even retirement, even as a hypothetical still decades away, feels somehow off the table. I can imagine switching the kind or frequency of work that I do, but I don’t know if I could accept a state of “not working.” There’s always more that I can, and should, be doing.
Fortunately, I don’t only feel anxious when I look ahead.. It may be scary and all my hopes and dreams and plans may come crashing down in spectacular fashion, but at least it’s not set. The future can still be shaped and changed. Whereas, the present often feels like a place in which I’m stuck, forced to deal with things as they are. Forced to deal with the future.
I think this anxiety is common for many in our generation, cursed by an inability to fully experience and appreciate the living of our lives,instead desiring to read its wikipedia page. While some of us may be on the brink of some of the biggest decisions of our lives – marriage, jobs, children -- many of us are still just trying to get by. It’s a feeling that permeates our entire generation. We’re delayed, stuck in a never-ending state of adolescence. So why not look ahead to the future, where we can at least imagine that we will feel like we have our shit together? And comfort ourselves in the now with sports gambling, drugs, hours spent on TikTok, whatever keeps us going.
9/11 and the 2008 financial crisis primed our sense of the world; they taught us that nothing is safe. Older millennials grew up with the optimism of the late 80s and early 90s. When the world fell apart in their adulthood, it surprised them. It’s why they’re bitter and self-oriented. Gen-Z came into a world that was already falling apart, which is why some decided to fuck shit up and others pre-gave-up and just get fucked up. But us young millenials, us cuspers if you will, never had the optimism, nor did we have the acceptance. We’re stuck in the horrible, anxious middle ground. We’re stuck helplessly treading water, swim class overachievers. With a desire to do our best, but with no place to go. Aware, always, that someone else is steering the ship.
Of course, thinking about and preparing for the future isn’t bad. It’s important. Especially given that the world is probably going to change in our lifetime more dramatically than maybe any time in the past. But there’s a frivolity to protecting a thing that’s imaginary; a world we want to be small and safe. Life is short. Should I use that short life to journal? Is focusing on all the little details of a day; a summer; a lifetime good for you? Is it presence or is it judgment? You can remember and reflect on moments, big and small, but no matter what, life goes on.
Looking back on my journal now, it’s funny how almost everything I wrote down was so mundane: “Cooked eggs and bacon.” “Baptism at church (yelling baby).” “Gravity bong in Francis’ garage. Got too high, needed to lie down.”
It’s comforting sometimes to realize how boring most days are.
Kris Allen, who you obviously remember was the winner of Season 8 of American Idol, has a song called “Live Like We’re Dying.” I was always obsessed with it because, while it may seem trite, it really is hard to truly grasp that we are all on the path to death. Whether quickly or slowly, we have no idea.. There are places to go, things to do, and people to love and fuck and hate and sometimes all three. We’re all dying. So get to it!
February 22nd 2024
- Woke up early, wasted time on my phone.
- Zoom meeting for my part-time gig.
- Made lunch and watched random YouTube videos.
- Did some work on this piece.
- Brought my girlfriend a smoothie at work.
- Went home, ate a snack.
- Did a stationary bike work out while watching TV.
- Did more work on this piece.
- Ordered in dinner with girlfriend and ate dinner.
Watched a movie with her then went to bed.