My ninety year old grandfather called me frightening today.
He said so because he has been to this website and has realized that at the age of eighteen I have decided what I want to do with my life. Although I know that my passions could take many forms, and part of the excitement of my life right now is visualizing those forms, I have no doubt that I will stay dedicated to my three interests: art, people, and the connections between them. Even if I were to surprise the entire world, drop all the art jobs I have, and go to accounting, I would still have the most colorful cubicle there and would probably do my best to start an after work art class for my co-workers to unwind.
Most people my age have just finished their first year in college. I’m asked all the time if it feels weird to have skipped high school and I’ve finally figured out how to answer. No, it doesn’t. My life, where I started college at fourteen, moved to a new city, got two jobs, and found an apartment at seventeen, and started graduate school at eighteen, is all I know. To me, it’s weird to think that if I had made different choices, I would be bumming around my hometown, searching for summer jobs and internships right now. Even I can barely imagine it.
As of yet, I have no real regrets in my life. Sometimes, this is wonderful, and sometimes it’s… not. Having no regrets can be less than wonderful because you realize that no matter how awful your day is, how hard your life is at that moment, or how much the world feels like it hates you, you wouldn’t have done anything differently. And that means that you have to accept that feeling shitty is just part of the bargain.
I’ve started explaining my approach to life like this: I will fight my entire life to reach Utopia, but if I ever got there I would be devastated. Because what I am passionate about is the struggle, its feeling every awful feeling that passes through me so that I can truly appreciate when those awful moments are gone. I never want to reach all of my goals, because then I wouldn’t have anything left to work for. Thankfully, with the amount of ideas my mind comes up with everyday, I don’t think I’ll ever accomplish all my goals, and I take great solace in that.
My grandfather called me frightening today because he didn’t figure out what he wanted to do with his life until he was forty while I first articulated my passion when I was sixteen. Although he told me that he won’t be around to see all the things I will achieve in my life, the fact that he called me frightening on Father’s Day is a memory I will hold with me for the rest of my life, whatever I do or do not accomplish.