Thirty-five. This always seemed like an adult age when I was not thirty-five. It felt old, ancient, unapologetically mature. But, now that I hold the number in my hands, I realize I am not an adult or any of those other labels. I’m a kid in a grown-up’s body – wide-eyed and clueless.
Sort of clueless. Maybe clueless. Certainly not entirely sure I’m doing it right.
This is supposed to be the age people own homes, the age couples are married with kids, the age individuals do responsible things like save for retirement. Not me – a renting, single, book-buying woman, age only measurable by the thick goop of night cream under her eyes, my eyes.
I am an imposter hanging out in an adult body. The kid inside me still thrives. I clap my hands when excited, I eat chocolate until my stomach groans, I stare in wonder at the world around me. Sometimes, I even cry when I don’t get my way. I have dreams and responsibilities. A sweet tooth and a line of credit.
I got the “Turning 35 Blues” last week. A brief spell of disappointment tipsy with disbelief. Trumpets and trombones of regret and comparison. A country song written in tears and snot.
The physical act of aging has never been a concern – apart from that sneaky hangover that now stretches days rather than hours. And the experience that comes with age is exciting – the delirious act of learning something new about the world with every sunrise and sunset.
But, in that moment of despair, I was fraught over the great chasm that seems to exist between where I stand and where my dreams live. An assortment of dreams I only gathered the courage to pursue four short years ago, when I began to truly believe in the possible. They are dreams that take time to bend and twist and build into being. And while I’ve made grand strides since commencing, I am the most impatient of souls.
I regretted my slow start. Regretted living idly throughout my twenties. Regretted not leaping into literature and writing at that moment passion struck at age eight. Instead, I packed the love away in a box marked, “Impractical,” and placed it in storage, only ripping it open again at age thirty-one.
Served alongside the regretful analysis of life was comparison. First I compared against friends and acquaintances, asking myself and the air around me questions like: Where is my baby? Where is my husband? Where is my house? A trio of possessions I’ve never particularly pursued, yet felt I should have acquired by now.
And then I engaged in the worst comparison of all – Beyoncé, a woman only a year younger than me who seems to have it all. And the anxious questions continued, escalating in shrill intonation: How can someone reach their dreams so quickly and easily? How did they know with such surety? How did they know how to do it? How come I haven’t made it yet? I sat there berating myself for not being like Beyoncé in my twenties and reaching success by my thirties. I mean, come on. It’s Beyoncé.
Comparing is torturous.
It feels like thousands of spit wads hitting the face at once. Soggy and determined. Other people’s, younger people’s, milestones pockmarking skin.
Comparing isn’t accurate.
You can’t measure another’s life against your own. Perceptions and branding and presentation skew the data. You don’t know how anybody sees life, what their own troubles are, until you live behind their eyes and inside their head. No one really knows what they’re doing as they step gingerly through their years. It’s everyone’s first time. We’re all clueless, but we show it differently, or we mask it with the confidence that everything will work out. Fake it ’til you make it.
Comparing stops progress.
We are all different people. With our own stories. The world would be a boring place if we all told the same tale. The day after I started writing this, I came across Oliver Sack’s piece reflecting on life after being diagnosed with terminal cancer. His eloquent words were exactly the ones I was searching for – “…it is the fate — the genetic and neural fate — of every human being to be a unique individual, to find his own path, to live his own life, to die his own death.”
I never think of this rationale or acknowledge my accomplishments or remember all I have to be grateful for when I’m in the fleeting doldrums of despair. Instead, I ride the darkness and wait to come out the other side into daylight, moonlight, or starlight. And so now, clear-headed at 35 and two days, I write this down in the hopes it sticks to my grey matter like memories of a kiss – one always remembers an outstanding, breathless kiss.
Those milestones adults are “supposed” to hit are soaring generalizations. They are not my story. At least not yet.
Instead of holding myself up against these ill-fitting standards I’ve assigned to adults, I will tailor my own life. I will only see my inimitable trail littered with both gumdrops and thistles at my back and the exciting unknown ahead. And every day I will take another step towards my dreams.
Our daily experiences make us who we are. Not our age.
I am a new person every morning I wake up.
I am not old. I am new.
And because of this, I’m glad I spent my twenties the way I did. The experiences made me who I am today.
With a web of wrinkles around my eyes and in my heart, now sure that no one ever truly feels like an adult, I know that a number doesn’t define me.
<
No Comments