Perhaps you guessed I also mark strides of ten days. I'm better satisfied by their greater substance than those of societal seven-day weeks. There's more time for an adventure or arc in each one; more of a chance to lose sight of the start from the end.

With over three times the length, that effect is much further magnified by considering thousand-day stretches more primary than years. And with fewer of them, deciding on a personal theme or goal for each feels more reasonable and more momentous.

My aim by day 14,000 was to have transitioned entirely from working in town to personal projects. That's been no small task logistically or constitutionally, but I'm still here on the planet, still fortunate enough to type away in near-optimal conditions.

I decided to make the thousand days beginning day 15,000 (the start of my fourth "childhood") about placing a childhood-like fresh consideration above an accumulated lens or set of conclusions with respect to most everything, particularly basic thoughts and day-to-day facets of life.

It would be impractical to take an extreme with that: I didn't want to forget and have to relearn the English language or anything. But I was pleased to find myself, one recent day, standing here in Asubol, looking quietly at the walls, cupboards, carpets and trinkets, and realizing I was seeing something very much more like interesting shapes, colours, and textures than, say, things to take into account for their durability or fashionability when deciding whether to allocate money and sign a lease. I even gazed at our Yoshi ornament, hanging from the ceiling fan, seeing it as someone might have seen it who was growing up with Yoshi fully established in his modern form, with his calmer and lengthier proportions from Super Mario World's marketing art part of a dim and fixed history before my arrival. Yoshi!

I think that's the kind of viewpoint that makes a childhood home feel like home in a way little else can, palace or hovel. And it seems very important to ponder if one cares about such things.

In any case, the final one of that thousand days has come. This "childhood" continues through day 20,000, but this new thousand days, beginning at 16,000, affords its own directive. And for me, it builds on the theme I mentioned earlier with respect to day 14,000.

Simply making room for the kinds of things one wants to do doesn't seem so challenging for some, but I've had to work up some fortitude and discipline to allow myself. Even past that point, living safely and healthfully has its priorities and inconveniences. I've still found myself keen to inform myself, sometimes day after day, that my fondest whim ought to wait. But, as I eventually noted in a way I once had never tested, I'm still here on the planet, still privileged to type.

"What's the worst that could happen?" is a useful question when taking a risk. And while choices have costs, it turns out no cost has come close to my imagined worsts. And doing what you choose to do comes with benefits otherwise missed. You presumably accomplish it, you improve at doing it, and perhaps you find new ideas there. "Cost" can mean "bad" – something you lose – but it's not "loss," it's "cost." It implies you also get something, and at least you're choosing what.

So, vague story short: reaching day 16,000, for me, is about worrying less than ever about what I'm choosing to work on.

I think I've only noticed one other person expressing this exact thought. It was some creative person on a podcast, saying something like that they'd learned it was okay to work on "what their brain wants to work on." Perhaps that phrasing is a little organ-pomorphic (or uniquely accurate?), but I recognized the meaning.

I did wait patiently through all of school and much employment to finally fully control my outsets, after all. And I wish some of the same for you if you're of any similar mind.

In any case: onward to day 16,001.