Ok, let's face it. Growing up is hard. I mean, not all of it. The years between, say, your first memory and eleven tend to be alright. They have their own particular sets of hardships and heartbreaks, and I admit that for some people, they are the hardest years. But speaking in the most general sense, the years leading up to your teens tend to be pretty stress-free. Then you become a teenager and everything suddenly gets much more complicated. Hormones and Calculus, angsty poetry and dating and diets and college applications... It all becomes overwhelming. But throughout this exhausting period in your life, there is one great, shining hope. High school graduation.
Somehow, we manage to convince ourselves that once we graduate from high school, all the insecurities, the petty fights, the drama, the doubt.... It will all melt away, like magic. And when it doesn't work out that way? When it turns out, as it inevitably does, that the hardships and the heartaches of high school don't end with high school, we turn once again, as we must, towards the future. Towards our twenties, which folkloric wisdom suggests will be the greatest years of our lives.
No one can really pinpoint why that seems to be the case. Since there is not, to knowledge, a spike in suicides as people reach their thirties, it may just be a mix of nostalgia and stress: a yearning for a time when the biggest decision you had to make was what to wear out on a Saturday night and whether to drink Smirnoff or Absolut. I imagine that your thirties, as with your teens and your twenties, bring with them their own unique set of privileges and experiences, both good and bad. And I certainly don't believe that we peak at our twenties, and everything is downhill from there. Largely because, if this is true, I should kill myself now and get it over with. Which doesn't seem like a strong life choice.
So, as I was saying, coming into my twenties, I was feeling pretty positive about this decade of my life. I had finally escaped high school, my hometown, my familial influences, and the final trappings of my teenage existence, and started my twentieth year single, independent and, well, I'm going to say confident but perhaps what I really mean is "hopeful". I had spent so many years being "so-and-so's daughter" or "that guy's girlfriend" or "you know, the smart debating chick", that escaping my teen years felt like coming into my own and trying to figure out who I was when I wasn't connected to anything or anyone but me. And as daunting as it sounds, it has also been exhilarating .
So this is where I plan to chronicle some of that journey, which is far from over and has already taught me so much. I'm not sure what the goal is, really. To help guide others? Maybe, but it seems unlikely, since everyone needs to find their own path to adulthood and maturity. To journal the experience for myself? More probable, though that would beg the question, why make it public? The cliche answer, but also the most accurate one, is that the blog is like the experience itself: I won't know what it's going to be until it gets there.
But I'm looking forward to the ride.
Until next time....
Dee
