For over a decade, I ran a YouTube channel — a modest operation born in my late forties. Calling it a channel might be too grand: there were no edits, no soundtracks, no backgrounds, no clever image inserts. Just me, my watches, and a stubborn refusal to pretend I knew anything about video production. It was, in essence, a podcast that forgot it was supposed to be seen.
I built a small but loyal audience — over 10,000 subscribers, steady commenters, familiar names. Within the narrow but fervent watch community, I was a known entity: a man chronicling the eternal scuffle with watch addiction.
But now, staring down my sixty-fourth birthday this October, I’m stepping away — and not with a heavy heart, but with something closer to relief.
First, I have no desire to become an influencer. The idea of monetizing my channel, hawking brands I barely tolerate, feels as alien as joining a boy band at my age. Second, I have zero interest in learning the sacred arts of Final Cut Pro wizardry. The polished, professional YouTuber life was never my ambition. Third — and most importantly — the fire that once drove me is gone. And good riddance. Fire, in my case, has always been another word for addiction — the old need for validation, the parasocial buzz of comment sections and endless watch chatter. I don’t want the fire back. I want peace.
Does this retreat from YouTube mean a pivot to podcasting?
No.
I’m not looking for a new mirror in which to admire or define myself. I don’t need the hustle of relevance, or the 3 a.m. panic about subscriber counts. A podcast requires not just a theme but conviction — a genuine need to say something the world hasn’t already heard. Right now, my life is full of smaller, quieter things: amateur piano practice, kettlebell workouts in my garage, a general interest in health and fitness. None of these scream “launch a weekly show.”
Sure, I could bang out a fitness video for people over fifty — it would take thirty seconds: Stay active, love people, eat real food, prioritize protein, lay off the booze. There, fitness empire built.
But combing through the absurdly granular debates of the diet-industrial complex? No thanks.
Truthfully, most social media feels unbearable to me now — bloated with performative sincerity, vibrating with empty gestures. I’m done performing. Like many, I have full-blown social media fatigue.
And then there’s the nagging ghost of my old literary ambitions — the dream of publishing memoir, fiction, or some slippery hybrid of the two, the sort of “autofiction” the novelist Emmanuel Carrère perfected. That ghost finds me now, not on YouTube, not on a podcast, but on my blog.
The blog is where I now quietly reign.
Not as a digital emperor counting clicks, but as a stubborn craftsman hacking away at the weeds of complacency. I don’t know if my writing will “take off” or “storm the world.” I only know it helps me process the madness, fight entropy, and stay alert to the real battle — the one against mindless consumerism and numbing repetition.
So here I am, in what I suppose I could call the next chapter.
The Performative Hangover Years.
The Post-COVID Malaise.
The Be Brave in Your Sixties Project.
I’ll get back to you with the final title once I’ve lived it a little longer.
