I’m currently alone with a burrito, watching “Life” being narrated by David Attenborough. I’m on a break from my next project so I can write this so excuse the hastiness. I could sit here and talk to you about the past 2 decades of my life from my birth to this very moment but I’m not going to do that. I want to keep this as short as possible. So rather than telling you about the past 2 decades of my life, I’m going to tell you what I think being 20 feels like and my plans for the next decade or something along those lines.
I feel like 20 is that weird age where you’re no longer a teenager but you’re not exactly an adult yet but I like the weird vibe being 20 gives off. I also feel like the greatest thing about being a teenager is that you’re allowed to sort of do whatever you want. Like you’re at a point where you’re expected to be an adult but you don’t really have any responsibilities. You can get away with so much as a teenager and no one realizes this. You don’t need experience to do something and talk to someone. You just go do it. I’m a bit disappointed I didn’t realize that until my late teens but when I actually put things in motion, I had the most insane year of my life.
Sometimes I think about all the experiences I’ve had and I wonder if life can get better. I wonder if I’ll have experiences that will be better and more memorable than the ones I’ve already had because sometimes you never know. Life is something that can change up on you very quickly. Sometimes I wish I could go back in time, not to change things but to feel a couple things twice.
I’ve been writing code for nearly half of my life and while I still love it, I think it’s time for something new. I made music for a while but I stopped, to the dismay of some. It’s not that I didn’t like making music, it’s that I feel like there’s more pressure now. There’s pressure to be successful. There’s pressure being the first born not only in my immediate family but my extended family. There’s pressure to be the one that does things right. There’s pressure that whatever I do, I have to mold it into something everyone likes. Something that I don’t define. But yo, pressure isn’t a bad thing. If anything, it’s what I need. Pressure allows me to zero in and focus on what really matters. Making something good and achieving my goals, that is the only thing in my mind. That’s all I really think about.
There’s something about my birthday. Like every year, I was celebrating my birth day but this year, I’m celebrating the year. I want to celebrate the things I did between 19–20 or 20–21 rather than simply celebrating the day. I’m celebrating the amount of work and the amount of change I put in into the year and I feel like that’s what people should do when their birthday comes around. Me celebrating my birthday differently is because I want to define what that means to me so I’d rather celebrate the past year rather than the day I was born on.
I’m glad I took time out while I was 19 to be introspective about my life. I’m glad that I realized that my childhood dreams were always tales of glory while reality is a lot messier and more dramatic. I’m glad that I realized that I don’t have to do what everyone else is doing. I’m glad I figured out that the term “fuck it, ship it” doesn’t really work for everything. That in order to do something worthwhile, I have to treat my projects with respect and respect the time that it takes to make something the way I want to make it.
Like I said in my gap year post, I still don’t know what purpose even really means and why we search for it, but what I do know is that as corny as it may sound, you have to enjoy “the search” because ultimately it might be the only thing we end up with.
There are so many questions that I’m trying to ask, and I’m still so far from being done saying what I gotta say. I’m honestly just trying to do as much as I possibly can in one lifetime. I’m not worried about the years. I’m worried about the life and the body of work that I can put out while I’m breathing.
A goal of mine for the next decade is to give my parents that house in Nigeria. Finished, done, built. For them to look back on this and say “You know what, this is what we went to America for.”
But my main goal for the next decade is to make something on the level of “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.” I don’t know what it will be but I want it to be on that level and I know it’s going to be on that level. But yo, I haven’t even dropped my “College Dropout” of anything yet.
We’re still on mixtapes.
My name is Fisher and if you’ll indulge me, I’m 20 at midnight and I wonder what’s next for me.
