The Panic of Growing Older

I have been panicking for 365 days straight

I feel like I’m already 40. I think all my apprehension can be explained by that simple fact. I feel like I am already forty. I still cannot drive. Do you know any forty year old that cannot drive a car? I don’t.

I almost died at birth. First of all, I was a tumor baby, on account of my ginormous head and my mother’s narrow hips. I also slept badly in her stomach. When my mother gave birth to me, she says she stuck her nipple in my mouth for hours, and I sucked. But I never ever got full. I continued to cry and cry and cry. This happened for three days. My mother then returned to the hospital and found out that she’d not been feeding me as she wasn’t producing milk. True story. So for the first three days after I was born, I didn’t eat. Maybe that’s why I’m such a hungry boy.

I will start with an interesting episode. That day, my Aunty appeared in my home at 6AM in the morning. I’m not joking; she left her home at 4AM and appeared at mines at 6AM. I was a bit surprised, given that I didn’t even have to direct her. Anyway, she seemed overly cheerful and once in my house she asked if I had any food. I said I didn’t, and she offered to make for some. She asked me to go get chicken, and by the time I was back from the market she’d cleaned my whole home up. This was rather surprising to me, but my aunt isn’t above excessive home making, so I took it in my stride.

Then she settled down and said she came to my house for two reasons. She quickly dispensed with the first reason, and moved to the second. She said that my mother has been complaining that she’s never seen me with a woman, and I was getting older so I needed to remedy that situation quickly. I tried to laugh it off, but she was really serious. She was so serious that they made me promise to at least bring one girl home in the new year. This year. The urgency with which my aunt made the point just made feel 20 years older. Are they seriously wondering about marriage? For small me? Really?

“When I met you, I didn’t know you’d be like this… there’s nothing you say no to. You’re just like every other guy”

I love teasing my friends — who have loved and lost — about their horrible love choices. My argument is that heartbreak only occurs when you date stupid people, or are a stupid person. Of course that’s stupid, but it’s an easy way to tease people. Sometimes I wish they could tease me too.

These days I’ve started putting a lot of thought to the sort of wife I’d like. 5 years ago, it would have been an easy question. I’d like a working woman, who’s a partner, who’s smart and beautiful, who takes care of me as well as I take care of her, and a partnership that’s equal, not necessarily in details, but in spirit.

I’ve found that it’s not such a cut and dry issue. First of all, there are only maybe five women in the country who would find such an arrangement appealing. The optimal situation for most women, regardless of what they say in public, is to have someone who observes patriarchal responsibilities towards them while they observe none in return. That's not a situation I would be caught dead in. But merely stating my preferences is only a quarter of the struggle. I have to actually put myself in this horrid game despite the state of my emotional bandwidth. I spoke about this with an older friend, and she told me there’s the right person out there. But like I’m now fond of saying, do good women drop from heaven? Or, like a smarter man than me once wrote, beautiful naked big titty women don’t just fall out the sky you know.

Children born in one’s youth are like arrows in the hand of a warrior

I have realized that my general listlessness over the past year is due to a lack of things to look forward to. When I was younger I could look forward to graduating from the university, getting a job, even getting a girlfriend. The future was always in front — always shimmering in the sun and waiting for me to grab it and put in my pocket. That future is here, but it is dull and uninteresting. Don’t be fooled by my fortunes, dear reader. I have a job and a roof over my head, and I know many my age would kill to have my dull circumstances. As such, someone may ask me to play them the world’s smallest violin for my (many) misfortunes. However, that does nothing to remedy the facts. Life is boring. Not much is happening (to me). And it is running me mad.

“The first claimed to be open, but her actions showed her to be lying. The second had an emotional connection with me, but a serious logistical reason why building a home might not be feasible. For my wife though, she was both open, reciprocal, and logistically feasible. My parents were involved early, and we finalised when things were ready.”

Perhaps, I have a future with kids to look forward to. But I am not looking forward to it at all. In fact, I can only process that future in my mind as yet another expense that I would have to pay for by myself. Who will help me pay for it? How can I look forward to future debt? How do I look forward to long nights with crying children? How do I look forward to tinkering with the generator set while my wife and kids wait in darkness? How do I look forward to working on math home works after an extremely long day at work? How do I look forward to waking up at 4:30 AM to prepare the kids — and myself — for school and work? No, dear reader. I am not looking forward to these things — I would rather postpone them and not think about them till I cross that bridge. If I decide to cross it. At this point, the only thing I can reasonably look forward to — because it won’t (hopefully) cost money — is death.

That decision, however, must be made quickly. If one gives birth to their first child at 30, the child would be 30 when they are 60. If one waits five years more, the child would be 35 when they are 65. This does not sound like a bad plan, except when you realize that life expectancy in Nigeria is around 53 years old. Forgive my statistical illiteracy, but I am going to interpret this to mean that anyone living past 53 is living on borrowed time. The fact that chronic illnesses are most certainly a death sentence in Nigeria just makes things a bit more complicated. One may not even see 50. So whether or not to have a family (and when!) is a decision that I must make in the next two years at least. But dollar is 1635 today. How can you make any decision in such troubling circumstances?

“Marriage is a great endeavour. Like all things great, it is filled with much peril. The modern world and media would have you believe it is not worth it—a mere relic of our unsophisticated past. But it is a lie.”

As they say; children born in one’s youth are like arrows in the hands of a warrior. I don’t know of any arrow that requires pampers, Cerelac, and school fees. It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. I don’t yet have a good fortune.

Smoking cigarettes to look cooler?

Why not?

Pride and Prejudice

My socio-economic condition has always felt somewhat fake. I come from rather humble beginnings. My mother did not attend university, and my father didn’t either. So from that standpoint, I am starting on really awful footing. The interesting thing, though, is that my uncles and aunts are rather accomplished. So you have a condition where I am adjacent enough to middle class-ness but not quite middle-class myself. But for some reason this has never affected my self esteem. I have always considered myself middle class, even when I am certainly not. I only attended a private school on the charity of my uncle, and when that ran out I eventually attended a proper public school like the rest of my class mates. Despite this, I have always felt destined, as you would say, for higher (relatively speaking) things.

I remember my first actual girlfriend. Her name was Seun 304. I have no idea why we called her that. You know what? That is a lie. I remember well, but I don’t think that is relevant for this newsletter. And I’m just realizing that 304 is today a euphemism for hoe. She was no hoe.

“I want to buy Scottish loud”

“For who?”

Anyway, Seun was a classmate and was from a similar background as me. We were in the same public school and suffered the same indignities that public school students suffered at the time. But I am ashamed to admit that for some reason I just never felt we were on the same plane. I just never felt we were in the same class. Despite the fact that her uniform was sharper, her socks sparkled brighter, and she generally looked in a better condition than I did. I don’t know if it is pride, but I hesitate to categorize it so. It could not have been pride because I did not look down on her. How could I? This was someone who’d chosen to date me. But I just always felt that I was more and she was less. Like I was destined to be more. I believe the scorecard is now out. She probably has a kid now, and the odds are high that I might end childless.

Do not be dismayed dear reader — I understand, better than anyone, my hubris. But it continues nonetheless. I have chosen my words very carefully thus far, and yet I feel like I have not completely expressed what I feel. Perhaps it is something you can only understand if you have felt it before.

By searching, I mean that I was actively looking at women in my circles and assessing them based on their suitability as my spouse… I did not date. I did not do talking stage. I did not do situationships or "it's complicated".

In the end, I’m beginning to realize that I’m not above a normal live with normal anxieties and normal struggles and normal tears. I’m not even above abnormal struggles and abnormal anxieties and abnormal fears. I’m not above great poverty or sickness or desperation or failure or disgrace. If horrible things happen to me, they don’t happen because I did something wrong or didn’t try enough; horrible things simply happen. That’s life, and you have to roll with the punches. But if I’m not above them, why haven’t they happened to me yet?

Mis-directions

I am in a pool, and it is around 9pm. Everyone is having a good time. It is a conference for university students and there are a bunch of kids from about ten other universities. So, as they say, you know the vibes.

My hormones are raging and I do something I never do; I speak to a girl. She was nice enough, and we exchanged information. I asked her what University she attended, and she told me. I lodged it in my brain and continued the conversation. I must stress here — lest I forget — that the conversation was pleasant. She seemed to have a lot of fun talking to me, and we laughed heartily.

“You don’t know, it’s the Yoruba woman inside of me. I have to sell something. I have to have shop”

The next night I discovered something accidentally. This person, who I thought I’d hit it off with, had lied to me about the university she attended. The purpose of the lie was immediately obvious. This person did not want me to find them. Why would they do that? I kind of understood the why, but it stung a lot. Months later, I met this fellow again, and this time she’d totally forgotten the lie and complimented me on something. In fact, she seemed really into me. I wanted to take the compliment in good faith and maybe start talking to her, but I couldn’t.

How were our parents so disciplined about not taking fish in the pot

A big problem for me now, though I hate to admit it, is getting a pot of soup to last more than a four days. It doesn’t matter how much I spent on it, or how many pieces of meat and fish are in it, I just can’t get it to last more than four days. It’s an embarrassing problem too, because none of my friends ever speak about facing such quandaries. I find it impossible to talk myself out of going into the pot and taking all the meat I can eat. After all, it’s mine, isn’t it? I bought it and made it myself. Who’s going to arrest me for eating what I bought myself? So two kilos of chicken end up lasting about four days. It’s a difficult problem. Any advise before I eat away my future?

what are some good 26 year old activities for someone just getting into being 26

Here is how an average day goes for Mr Josie Elewa. He wakes up around 4:30 AM to a very cold room. He sleeps back because why not? He wakes up again by 6:30 AM. And then rolls over and grabs his phone. NEPA takes light. No more A/C, so he struggles out of bed. If it is a running day, he organizes his playlists and gets into his running clothes. If it isn’t, he presses his phone till the paranoia of losing his job forces him to pack his laptop and go to a workspace to work on his many projects. Half of which don’t earn him any money — this Substack is an example of one of such projects. Thankfully, the other half earn him enough money to waste so much productive time on unproductive labor.

After 7 or so hours of work, he clocks out and begins the walk home. The bus has all manner of characters, but most seem to be in the same shoes; tired from a long day of work. Remember, Mr Elewa knows no one at his workspace, so he maybe says four words throughout; good morning, good bye. He gets home and makes food. There are only two choices, really. You either boil pasta or boil rice. On his wealthier days he can afford to fry plantain and eggs. On his poorer and lazier days, indomie would do. Afterwards, he gets (or got) on a video call with his girlfriend. They speak for one hour or so — and he has been positively reassured that this isn’t enough communication for serious lovers. But that is as much as his emotional bandwidth can handle. So we manage. Then he puts on the A/C, takes a swing of Orijin Bitters or whatever cheap liquor is available, closes the doors, and goes to bed. You may think, well, that’s too much drinking Mr Elewa! You will get fat in no time! To that he answers; what do you think the running is for?

On the weekends when one should enjoy their youth, he wastes his time talking to fellow idiots on Twitter and writing long essays very few people care about. One day, at a friend’s house, he says he’s never been to a rave or a club, and younger friends cannot believe it; seriously? You’ve never been? Yes is the quiet reply. Does he feel left out? No. But he wonders if bed rotting is a good waste of the one life he’s been given. However, you cannot blame him too much. Did you hear what uber prices look like now? We make do with what we have, friends.

The Panic of Growing Older

I have to say, I weep for the loss of youth. I recently went on a date and I told the fellow sitting across from me that I had an existential crisis about growing older, and she looked at me like I’d just sprouted beans on my head. She couldn’t believe it. Aren’t you excited to turn thirty? To turn forty? To turn fifty? She sounded like she couldn’t wait. I couldn’t understand it. Then she told me didn’t pay rent, and then everything clicked.

In a previous newsletter, I lamented about what Marcus Aurelius was doing at my age. But that seems like a step too far. These days I wonder more deeply about what my parents were doing at my age. Today, I’m sure I am one of the most important persons to my parents, but there was a time they didn’t know me. Today, I’m the apple of their eyes — but it wasn’t always so. They had a life before they met me. What did that life look like? Who was in it? What steps did they take that led to me? Did their lives only begin when they had me? What did they do at my age? Will my life only begin when I have kids? Aren’t these questions important enough to induce a panic attack? Do I even know them at all if I didn’t know who they were before they met me? Would my kids — if I have one — even know me? Would anyone? Does anyone? Will anyone witness my life? My parents made a lot of sacrifices for my life. Has it been worth it for them? Or do they look back at the juncture of that decision and weep for what might have been? Or maybe they are happy they left that life behind? Maybe this new lease on life has been extravagantly rewarding. Or maybe these are questions everyone my age has already litigated years ago, and I’m just immature. Maybe.

I have — or had — a friend who used to argue that he would rather kill himself than grow old and weak and frail. When I was younger I used to think this was macho nonsense. Age is merely part of existence. Why would you kill yourself to avoid something so normal? But I’m starting to see the point. If you had a vigorous youth, and had a sharp mind as a young man, your old age would be even more depressing. Isn’t that why some athletes push the limits of their age, just so they can bask in the euphoria of youth for one more year? Why do people like Ronaldo and Tom Brady and Iniesta and Pirlo and Buffon continue performing even at forty? Is it because of money? Or because they love sports so much? No. It’s because they all panic. They see their past, see their vigor, and weep for its loss. They weep so much they hold on to its last vestiges. Nobody wants to be an has-been. If given the choice, these players would rather be at the uncertain start of an uncertain career than be at the twilight of a magnificent one. The loss of an excellent past is more damaging to the soul than the hope of an unsure future. It’s better to have never had than to have had and lost.

The good thing is that I have no magnificent past, and I’m still at the threshold of an unsure future. But the principle still holds. I still feel like I’m already forty. I still cannot drive. Do you know any forty year old that cannot drive a car? I don’t.