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twenty plus ten
In one week I will be thirty. I'm pretty immature, so this may be shocking, but it is true. One year older! One year farther away from the traumas and disappointments that marked our collective adolescence! Hurrah!
I'll miss being twentysomething, I'm sure, but I will not miss the soul-searching and self-analysis that goes along with leaving adolescence and picking the next path (I know more of this awaits me, that you never stop picking paths throughout your life, but for now I've got a direction and a handful of maps and I feel excellent about it all). And I will not miss the panic and worry about achieving the goals I was told to work toward, whether I wanted them or not. I've missed most of those goals, and now the pressure's off. I'm not married or engaged. I don't have kids. I'm not the head of a company or even on my way there. I'm not competing with literary wunderkinds anymore, because I can no longer be considered a wunderkind myself. I have gotten to the age where people will not ask me questions like, "What's your major?" or "What do you think you want to do?" or "Are you seeing anyone?" or "Have you seen this article on the new baby boom?" because in their minds I'm past the age when these questions seem pertinent. I have started over in enough different jobs and careers to not be panicked anymore at the idea of starting over. I have picked up and moved enough times not to worry where or how I can live. I have gotten over trying to cram as much into my "youth" as possible, and now years stretch out in front of me to be filled in whatever way I want them to.
Getting older is awesome. The older you get, the further you get from everyone's expectations. The more your life becomes your own.
If you hadn't realized that it always has been.