Social media has allowed us to pretend that our lives are bigger than they are.
That our creative dreams and adventures, our mercurial entrepreneurship and our influence, match the great figures of the annals of humankind.
That we are somewhat a rockstar, a film star, with our achievements highlighted in Reels.
We were given the illusion that we can dance our worries away without actually learning to dance (sometimes, without actually liking to dance). The way a karaoke singer got lost in the song and felt he’s become a Michael Jackson.
But good thing I don’t have that postmodern affliction.
I turned 40. I held on to Robert Smith’s words: that 40 would cure you out of your dread in your 30s. That you’d accept and be grateful for your achievements, even when it’s not much.
I forgot he’s an actual rockstar. A frontman of the Cure, Alternative music OG.
Anyway, that’s not the point.
Being 40, like turning 17 or 21 or any chronological age measured by the revolution around the sun does not magically makes you into something. You already exist.
To quote another rockstar: ‘You are living on a floating rock, flying through space.’ How awesome is that? (again, plus point if you’re a rockstar—but thank you Chris). The religious talk about the miracle of life, while we atheists–seemingly nihilistic bunch–can celebrate life by reflecting on our cosmic insignificance.
Exactly because how improbable life is, life becomes something like a Jackpot.
Maybe life is a recycle machine. A test, an opportunity in becoming one with the Great Void–the Universe, God (with capital ‘G’).
But still, even if it isn’t, so what? The improbability, the moments of frugal happiness, the madness of love and the pain of lost; the chance to write your stories and make out a meaning: they make life worth living.
Regardless of this posing about wisdom. I am deeply insecure. I have my own little ambition in my little life. And that little ambition could use a little external validation.
I am made partner after 4 years joining the firm. Naturally, I am worried. Anxious of my new role.
Do I need to change my approach? Do I need to hustle?
Which, of course, my anxiety is objectively unwarranted. I have been playing the role of a partner, sans the title. I mean, at the very base level, I’ll make more money; my income can outpace the inflation (which in this recession, and given Indonesian weak currency, quite decimating).
Even a lawyer who is freshly admitted to the bar can open up a law firm and called himself a partner. But when you have worked in the industry for several established institutions, ‘anointment’ as a partner by one of them feels more of an objective recognition. Of course, at core, what matters in any profession is professionalism. A junior associate can recognize their useless and incompetent peers (or even their seniors and partners). we lawyers have straightforward organisational ranks in law firms: ‘associates’ and ‘partners’, sometimes ‘counsels’. You can tell where we’re at easily, unlike corporate title like ‘senior leader digital culture transformation’. (Dilbertesque truth: the longer your corporate title, the more obscure your role).
I guess, I’ll take the ‘business as usual, with alterations’ approach.
We are ultra social animals. We do need each other. Being an outcast threatens our survival. Maybe, if you’re like me–who lives in urban environments–there is no mortal danger for being separated from the herd. But you could suffer from loneliness and alienation.
In cities you can, and you must buy your way in. Money isn’t everything, but your survival and well-being depend so much on how much you make and spend. It’s a baseline resource. Like most inequal cities, Jakarta is bearable only if you have enough money. In a low-income country, enough is not much. But to generate money is not as easy as in a market economy.
That’s why I choose this profession. It’s a decent job. I can live comfortably. It’s also intellectually stimulating. I can pursue my creative endeavours with the financially security afforded.
I am more than one thing. But my identity as a lawyer is a big chunk of it. I am glad that I am not one of those Jakarta lawyers who only hangout with fellow lawyers. I’m friends with designers, artists and art workers, fitness professional and athletes, industrialists, engineers and make-up artists.
I know I live a privileged life. Regardless I am or I am not a partner, I know who my friends and loved ones are.
My chosen family who understands me better than my blood, even sometimes myself. Who’d make me accountable but still support me when I screw up. This achievement is not a requirement for their friendship, but rather a result of a good life lived off from genuine connections with them.
People complain that adulting is hard. I find it easier and more exciting than childhood. I mean, not that adulthood has less challenges, but we’re simply better at living. I make more real friends now compared to high school.
We take less shit when we’re older. We know better of what we don’t want. We communicate better as age gives you more perspective. And I moved up in socio-economic ladder, better read and better travelled.
My mother died this year, and so did my cat. I grieved for both of them. But I have lost my mother long before she died.
We moved out from Kecapi House. I have lived here since 2011, with Dinda’s parents. Everyone questioned how we managed to coexist.
We saved money on rent or homeownership, of course. But looking back, we are highly adaptive people. We were rarely home. Spent most of our time at the office, gym, dining and going out in more central areas; travelled.
There’s no way I’d spend my life tied to this city by home ownership. Unless I make it as one of the upper classes who can afford multiple homes in high-value area. (Then again, if I have reached that income bracket, I won’t live in Jakarta.)
I dreaded suburbia. Jagakarsa is virtually a suburbia despite, administratively, it’s still Jaksel. It’s an ugly neighbourhood. A mosque in every street corner. I remembered how I found Negombo unsettling because there are Catholic churches everywhere (and they’re always full, the guesthouse owner told me). It was my familiarity bias that prevented me to notice Jagakarsa’s similarity. My mother-in-law’s osteoporosis was the wake-up call: that we need our own place. We could coexist amicably, tolerated each other, because we could leave each other alone. In Kecapi House, with three bedrooms and a garden, there was enough space.
But illness take up so much attention, the real value of space and time.
We started noticing our disharmony during the pandemic lockdowns. How I missed going to the office.
As we hunted for apartment, we questioned ourselves. Why we never thought of renting. Jakarta’s housing situation has changed since our parents’ time.
It is not financially unwise to rent instead to own anymore. I don’t want to get into decades of debt for a landed property in Bekasi.
We have lived in London. Why did we think we could or want to live like ordinary Jakartans anymore?
Our paradigm has changed. I hate car culture. Indonesian traditional family values have never really suited us (we are expected to withstand unlikeable distant or not so distant family during Eid or pengajian. If you do the family gatherings during Christmas, NYE or CNY, at least you can get drunk—but I still hear similar complains).
As soon as we moved into our Kemang apartment, we could start living the way we want. We’d try to recreate our London life as close as possible.
We can have dinner parties and gatherings. Enjoying non-halal foods and drinks at home.
I’ll open the Champagne from Eli in New Year’s Eve or housewarming party.
I’ll ask our friends to bless the apartment with their own way.
And one day or night, reflecting in my apartment–a space that is truly mine–I’d question why I didn’t move out sooner.
When you delay starting to invest your losses are greater because you lose more on the compounding benefits you could have earned if you started earlier.
But again, you didn’t know.
Life really does begin at 40. Up until then you are just doing research. Jung.
As I said to a fellow elder millennial: Now we have wasted our youth, we can start living.
Usually at the end of a year, I’d feel huzun. I would be worried about next year, but grateful that the passing year was filled with good things. The worst things anticipated (like World War III, the ecological collapse, economic meltdown, unemployment, terminal illness) did not happen in 2024. I managed to travel: attended Music of the Spheres and Eras Tour concerts in Singapore; revisited Istanbul with new eyes (it’s true that a man cannot visit the same place twice because the place and him have changed) and explored other parts of Turkey. Went to Bali with closest friends; Surabaya for a national conference on arbitration to present my paper; rode on Indonesia’s fast train Whoosh! for business trips in Bandung. Broke the record of my reading challenges: 58 books in a year—good and great books.
This time I’m feeling optimistic despite I have no confidence in the current Indonesian government (but then again, I never have). The authoritarian regime may be back in Indonesia, the genocide is still happening, the threat of another trade war between superpowers. I just hope the worst things would not happen, one more year.
In anyway, if otherwise, I’ll worry about it when it happens.
Now I’d like to recount what I did not achieve.
I didn’t win the World Nomads Film and Photography scholarship. But I concede that the winners truly deserve the scholarships. I got so much joy and inspiration watching their submission.
I didn’t get the Open Society fellowship. But the winners’ submissions are MOMA level. I can work on my proposed project, with or without the grant. And by putting my effort in writing the proposal, I have a blueprint (or, at least, a firestarter).
I still suck at catch wrestling.
My creative works have not yield recognition. I am glad that, at least, my legal career shows a tangible progress.
The failures and challenges are not devastating, merely stepping stones and learning curves. And I’m doing creative works for the joy I derive and to escape from the pain of not doing them.
I am experimenting, I am manifesting–nay, living up to my manifesto.
