About All The Answers

Post 1875:

Being a non-ridiculous adult isn’t the easiest gig in the world. You have to know things, understand how things work, have all the answers. In other words, you have to pretend.

I’ve always valued success. As a kid, I thought success was having as much fun and as many friends as possible. I considered myself extremely successful. Mission accomplished. Those were good times.

You know the song Glory Days by over-admired rockman Bruce Springsteen? It’s about looking back on carefree youth. Adulthood is a drag in that song. Or maybe he’s being deep and I’ve missed the point. Whatever.

My point is, despite having great younger years, I couldn’t wait to get my adult on. I mean, why not? When things are working, you expect they always will. It’s human nature, even when you try to be wise and hike up your pants for more serious proceedings.

To me, success as an adult always revolved around my creative life. The goal was always to make things that other people liked. This would justify my decisions, priorities, and prove my supposed talent. How are things looking, you might ask?

It’s complicated. I’ve been successful in ways I never expected and completely shut out of sure things. I started wanting nothing more than to write great songs. I wrote a few, maybe. Now I prefer writing (hopefully) great books. Not a conventional path, but we all have to adult in our own way.

I don't know how I feel about ambition. When I look at where I’ve been and where I am, how much did my ambition factor in? A lot of how things work out have nothing to do with ambition. You find out that there’s more luck involved than you’d like. Control is the young man’s delusion. Don’t get me wrong. Delusions are responsible for some of the greatest stuff in history.

It’s no bad thing to want success. The trick is knowing what success looks like. A trick I’m still teaching myself, for sure. I let you know when I have all the answers. Cheers and see you after.