Confessions of a 30 year-old man

First of all, do not mistake me to be 30. I know I look old but no…I’m still pretty young. I wish I was 30 though, it ‘looks’ so mature. Anyway this is not about me, I have to get to 30 first and examine this. But since I am writing about it, I want to be sure that the person reading this and myself do not go through the same.

My cousin just turned 30 last week. Quite a feat. But he never seemed happy about it for some reason. Forget the smiles and candle blowing, it works in the movies only. He says that he wished he was 20 again. Well. I’m 21 and I’m grumpy myself so why would he want to be me? I’m awful. He is supposed to be better.

I decided to ask him why and boy he had thoughts my friend. I thought my thinking was deep but this guy is just….*sigh*……deep.

Isaiah, is my cousin. During the run up to 30, he went from being a college student to being a professional mechanic, from owning stuff that only fit in a car trunk to repairing car trunks, from being single to married and apparently from being free of debt to being submerged in debt.

Well Isaiah wished he had told himself the things he is telling himself now when he was 20:

He wished he had connected better with many of his classmates. He usually ignored them and knew them by name and face. These guys ended up getting flawless careers and who knows how they would help him now that he is 30.

He wished he had saved just a little bit. He would have put away 100 shillings for the 10 years he spent drinking and partying. This in turn would help him cut down on housing costs in the future.

He wished he would have taken the overseas educational opportunity that came by in his time. We all know where he would be with that.

He wished he had been more entrepreneurial. He wished he would have started his own business and expanded it as time went by. It would have been flourishing by now.

He wished he could have used that credit card wisely. The credit card. It always lies that you have ‘plastic money’. Why does everyone think ‘plastic money’ is a lot of money?

He wished he had been politically involved. Isaiah’s friends are young politicians and appear on TV at least twice a day. He would have had that.

He wished he would have taken mentor advice seriously. He would have been just like them when they were 30.

He wished he would have taken at least one or two writing classes. He can barely write an application letter.

He wished he had postponed some of his purchases. He bought things that are not even existent at the moment. They became obsolete once he turned 30. Boys know what he’s talking about.

He wished he would have started planning for retirement when he first got to work. He’s 30 and was talking about retirement.

PS: He whispered that he should have avoided that chick Mercy from across the street, who later became his wife.

Moral: We who are still in our 20’s should embrace his confessions and make our lives better. Let’s not live to tell the ‘I wish’ story to our children. Let’s get to 30 better.