Real-Life Crisis

Well, it's official. I'm going to die around fifty. How did I come to this sudden realisation? Well, I currently feel as though I'm living through my mid-life crisis now... at 23. It actually might not qualify as a mid-life crisis, as such. Maybe more of a real-life crisis what with the sudden impending monotony and less of the extravagant purchases of Ferraris and band tattoos.

With one year of degree-study left on my personal horizon, I've become accustomed to a heightened sense of social life, swathes of free time to fill with leisurely activity and mostly having my rent paid for by the Student Loans company. The one thing that worries me the most is my poropective living situation; mainly boiling down to the question: "where will I live?". The cost of living is ridiculous at the best of times and the depressing thing about this is that I'm only just realising it now, as I stare the relentless ongoingness of real life square in the face. As it stands, I'm already fearing a future of dwindling monetary funds, frozen microwave meals and all work and no play making Jim a dull boy.

Even over these last few weeks as the Olympic Games trundles on in our dear capital, I can't help but flash back to 16-year-old me watching the 2012 host city announcement voting thingy on a rare Spring-Term day off, probably because I didn't have an exam that day but some of my peers who'd chosen double science or geography or something else useful did. Paris were the favourites, the news pundits knew it, the committees knew it, cameramen apparently knew it as they were ready to capture the moment that the French capital was announced the host of the 2012 Games and then, BAM! Curveball! London. Take that, world! Although I didn't know it yet, I had experienced a dream coming true.

I remember spending the rest of that day watching constant news coverage of the announcement, doing the maths to figure out how old I'd be when the Games came around, realising I'd be 23 and old enough and rich enough and socially popular enough to travel dahn sahff and experience the entire fortnight. I even proudly announced this to my mother multiple times with the words: "Oh, I'm going. I'm so going to it." I'm now 23, currently on leave from my student house and living as a temporary lodger at my father's flat working five days a week in convenience retail for a penny or two over minimum wage. I also haven't been to London at all in the past week and have no time or money to feasibly go during this one. Still, ah to be young and full of dreams.

Without wanting to ramble on too much but fearing I've done so anyway - thus only serving to make me want to shoot myself, the readers want to shoot themselves, the readers also want to shoot me and all of us wonder where we're going to get all these guns from - I've had, what a classmate of my Creative Writing sessions feels is a staple of good character development within a dawdling story like this; an epiphanic moment. If I carry on wondering what I want to do with my life rather than doing it, I'll freeze in the path of oncoming headlights in some three or four decades time reliving my entire life in the space of five seconds, and if the oncoming vehicle doesn't hit me first, I might as well die of boredom thinking about all those times I thought about what these times should look like.

Therefore, after thinking of the glum monotony I want to avoid, crying into a lukewarm cup of tea and watching endless repeats of episodes from My Name Is Earl, I've produced a list. A sort of bucket list, if you will. For me, it's more of a to-do list. Either way, the concept's the bloody same. Here's a bunch of things I'd like to do/achieve/experience with my own pathetic existence here before it gets snatched away from me and I have to watch endless repeats of episodes from My Time Being Jamie in the unholy underworld. As a rule, though, I'll only include things that are achievable within my own control. That way, acts of chaos and blind luck like "win the lottery" or "decide sex of own child" can't be added. I've also decided to put the list here, on the internet, as (a) proof to the world that I want to do things with my life, and (b) so I don't lose it.

As with the list from my 22nd birthday, which happened on the 22nd and consisted of facts about the number 22, this list primarily contains 22 things. More can be added as and when necessary.

1: Have a book physically published. This can encompass any form of writing: fiction, short story collection, biography, cookbook, mindless scribbling or otherwise.

2: Take part in, and complete, a London Marathon.

3: Read certain books I've wanted to read for a while.

4: Record an album or small collection of music, whether orinigal work or covers.

5: Learn and eventually be able to animate using Flash or equivalent.

6: Visit Japan.

7: Be sufficiently fluent in a language other than English.

8: Volunteer or work in a major crowd-pleasing event.

9: Write a small collection of scripts as a series of sitcom, even if unrealised.

10: Learn to drive.

11: Learn to play the violin.

12: Finally buy that PlayStation 3 I've been wanting since 2007.

13: Finish this pseudo-inspiring list of stuff... and by finish, I mean hit 22 things.

The list can never truly be finished though, can it? New dreams and goals are born every day...