I turn thirty in one week, and Iām having trouble staying focused on my Nanowrimo project.
Itās a sci-fi novel called Tomorrow Today, about an unpaid intern at a cable news network who volunteers to be sent into the future. She can send reports back to the present -- but she soon realizes that the time machine only works in one direction. She canāt go home. So she keeps jumping forward, getting further and further from the things that define her, hoping that sheāll find a time machine that can send her back.
(Iām anxious that I didnāt clarify the premise well enough. This is part of my problem -- Iām so worried about getting it wrong, I never finish.)
When I moved to Brooklyn, I told Roxy that I wished I could hop in a time machine and skip ahead to a point where Iād dealt with all the grief and panic of the break-up. I knew as I said it that it was impossible -- not because time travel isnāt real, because it totally is -- but because you have to be present and actively work on healing.
Iāve always wanted to skip ahead. In high school, I told my first girlfriend Anna that I couldnāt wait to be forty ācause Iād have it all figured out by then. I knew as I said it that it was impossible -- not because time travel isnāt real, because it totally is -- but because Iād seen enough of Buffy the Vampire Slayer to realize that Giles was still figuring things out, and he was supposed to be the wise grown-up.
Time travel is real. The time machines arenāt phone booths or clinical-looking chairs with wires and diodes. Art is time machines. Imbued with the right experiences and evocations, art can transport you to another time and place. Before Sunset planted this idea in my head, with Jesseās plan for a book that takes place within the span of a pop song. (That trilogy left a lot of marks on me. Jesseās āpet peeveā about reincarnation also inspired a story that Iāve been trying to break for over a decade.)
For years, Iāve been using time travel to avoid being present. Sometimes I want to skip ahead. Other times, I dwell on past heartbreaks, slights, and unfulfilled dreams. And sometimes when I canāt help but be present, I retreat into a fantasy life, rehearsing all the stories Iām not telling and the choices Iām not making.
Iām having trouble writing now because Iām having trouble making choices. I hate making choices -- thereās always the risk that youāll get it wrong. And I hate being wrong, so Iām always running away from choices. Iāve been so enamored with escapism my whole life. What if I leave stories behind for a bit? (Is that a different kind of running away?) What if I just try to be present? What if I get it wrong on purpose?
My parents are afraid Iāll get my life wrong, that Iāll make a choice that limits my options in the future. Itās a recurring theme in our conversations -- even now, as Iām about to turn thirty, and so many options have already fallen by the wayside. I get that they love me and theyāre trying to protect me. But I donāt want their protection. I donāt want to feel safe. The world isnāt safe. I want to feel like I have some control, some power. I want to be a grown-up.
I grew up thinking that being a grown-up meant setting aside what I wanted for the sake of other people. My dad was going to be a jazz musician, until his dad got sick. He ended up being a software company manager so he could afford to care for his family. My mom got her graduate degree in public policy, then chose to be a freelance writer and artist, so she could be home when my sister and I got back from school. Both of them set aside their career goals to have a family, and they always said it was worth it.
When I told them, āYou taught me that being a grown-up means compromise,ā they insisted that Iād misunderstood them. They just want me to make the best choice possible, using all available information. But what is ābestā? Whoās defining ābestā? What if my best choice doesnāt align with theirs? Will it look like a mistake? Will I have sacrificed some mythical, precious option?
Thatās what limits my options -- the fear of getting it wrong, of losing some opportunity. And, of course, not making a choice is a choice that has its own set of consequences.
Being risk-averse is like having a nervous friend, begging you to cling to what youāve got, even if what youāve got isnāt working. I get so risk-averse, so frightened of losing the mediocre and unfulfilling things Iāve got, that my dissatisfaction builds and toxifies until I canāt bear it anymore and Iām moved by necessity to etch-a-sketch everything. Iāve done this before. My parents are afraid Iāll do this again.
My parents donāt value happiness. Theyāve repeatedly said they donāt understand my generationās thing about āfollow your bliss.ā (I just looked up the phrase āfollow your bliss,ā and itās attributed to Joseph Campbell. Yeah, okay, weāre talking my g-g-generation, sure.)
Itās hard to be happy. You have to choose to be happy, and keep choosing.Ā ācause itās easy to let our lives be written by our memories of pain, humiliation, and loss. (āSad is happy for deep peopleā isnāt cool, itās lazy. Itās an excuse to accept that things are wrong. Itās an excuse to compromise.)
I want to be happy, even though it hurts to be alive. I live in a perpetual state of fear and frustration that Iāve been misunderstood. I love words, and yet every day I feel like Iām struggling to be understood. Being alive is a terrible, lonely, painful thing.
And, of course, the world is on fire.
Iām afraid to be present. Iām afraid it will hurt. But I spent my twenty-ninth year trying to do more things that frightened me. And this scares me more than anything.
I thought my life would be different somehow. I thought my life would better by now. But itās not and this is how I start to turn.
