Final answer:
Fitzgerald describes the 1920s as a transformative period filled with personal and professional growth. He conveys a sense of reconciled contentment with his life choices, mirroring the cultural revolutions and artistic dilemmas of the Jazz Age, characterized by the tension between genuine artistry and the need for commercial achievement.
Step-by-step explanation:
F. Scott Fitzgerald describes his life in the 1920s as a time of personal growth and acceptance of his career and life choices. He reflects on how his juvenile regrets about not playing college football and not serving overseas during the war evolved into mere fantasies that appeased him during restless nights. In addition, Fitzgerald notes that the bigger problems in life seemed to resolve themselves, indicating that his focus was primarily on his writing career, an aspect that left him forever unsatisfied yet independent—a parallel to the conflicted feelings of many artists like Fats Waller between their artistry and commercial success. In the context of the literary world, Fitzgerald's experience mirrors the broader reality of the 1920s, known as the Jazz Age, a time marked by great cultural shifts, a boom in artistic expression, and a flouting of traditional norms. This reality is represented in the contrast between the pursuit of artistic authenticity and the pressures of achieving commercial success, a challenge apparent in the careers of many contemporary artists and writers, including Fats Waller, mentioned in the question premise.