I’ve been thinking about why I freaked out a little when I turned 27. (And why I freaked a little more when I turned 25….and why the thought of turning 28 is also not so good…)
There is nothing wrong with being 27, or 28 or any age older than that actually. I am not uncontrollably ‘age-ist’. Nor does aging bother me primarily for vanity reasons.
I think what bothers me most about turning 27, is that I don’t in any way feel 27. My life doesn’t look that different from when I turned 24 actually. I’m still working for the same organization. I’m still single. I even still live in the same house that I first moved in to when I came to Vancouver. Other than weighing just a few pounds more than I did (to my deep chagrin) at 23, not much is different.
I guess I don’t know the ‘cues’ about aging, once you pass 25. At 25 you can rent cars without that extra service charge. I know you’re supposed to have a big ‘Ahh! I-just-turned-30-party!’ but in between? No clue. I will not own a condo or a house anytime soon. I probably won’t be having kids anytime soon. Reason for this being? I don’t reeeeeealy see myself married within the year, OR, within the next year. And, I’m actually pretty fine with that–my life is good. Even though it feels like I’m in stasis sometimes.
Like one day, I’ll wake up, be 31 and still doing the same things (pretty much) that I was doing at 24 and I’ll wonder with horror “WHERE DID THE TIME GO? HAVE I BEEN ON A SPACE SHIP SLEEPING WHILE THOSE I LOVED ARE WHEEZING WITH OLD AGE? “
My entire life up to the age of 25 was spent knowing how old I should feel by the milestones in my life. Who knew that after that rental car marker at 25, that I’d feel cut loose?
Douglas Coupland says that the best years of your life are between the ages of 31-35, that your ‘mental age’ (the age that you see yourself in your head) will stop here for the next 2 decades, and that you should grin and bear how awful your 20’s can be. Now, my 20’s have NOT been awful by any stretch of the imagination, but I do wonder when my ‘mental age’ will make its next shift ahead, to catch up to my actual age. It weirds me out. I think I’m missing things about being 27, because in my mind I’m all like ‘oooh, I’m still 23 and have all the time in the world!!!!!’
So that last sentence uncovers what really gets me about the incongruence between the age I feel and the age I am. If I still think I’m 23, than I’m not grasping how serious it is that my youth (and all this potential that public school taught me that I had) is not going to be there forever…to take for granted.
This thought kicks me in the but when I think about being more creative. And how 99% of my life is not oriented towards creativity–shamefully, I’m in consumption mode most of the time. True creativity always always always gives rather than just re-arrange what’s already out there. Rather than just appreciate, consume and move on.
I panic because I think I may be wasting it.
Wondering if I’m giving up dreams too easily. Wondering if my choices now are too safe. Wondering if I’ll deeply regret my easy-does-it 20’s when I’m older….wondering why I didn’t have more dreams in the first place.
Your 20’s are a time to dream and try things out. See what fits–what doesn’t. To pursue, instead of just talk.
I think I want my actual age, to be my mental age too.
3 responses so far ↓
Mindy // September 13, 2008 at 5:54 pm |
That’s interesting that you’re wondering about that because I’ve been thinking about the same thing; I’m 24 but what age do I feel like I’m at? I haven’t got a clue and I don’t know what it means to be 24. All I know is that I’m not 18 or 19… A part of me also feels like I’m quickly running out of time but when I logically think about it, I’m still young and have 50 years left of my life if God lets me live that long.
Anyway, if it brings you any reassurance, I feel like you’re at the age you’re supposed to be and I don’t think you’re wasting your life… I can’t fully explain why but it may be because whenever I see you, you radiate wisdom that I don’t have and I’m in awe of it
Nadine // September 13, 2008 at 11:26 pm |
“I panic because I think I may be wasting it.”
Thanks for your honesty, Wendy. I think it’s what most of us are thinking, yet can’t always articulate.
Love you.
Helen // September 18, 2008 at 1:40 am |
wait till you turn 29. the hopeless age at which you are at the end of the 20s which makes one ancient by the 20s standards, and at the same time cannot be glorified by the new “30s is the new 20s” because, well, you are not 30 yet… that was just my struggle as i turned the young age of 29 few months past.
i completely hear (read) you as if you are expressing my own thoughts for the past 4 years… so you are not alone sista. thank you for expressing, so articulately, the woes of the late 20s. by my standard, knowing some actual 23 year olds… i think being at the mental age of 23 is not a bad thing b/c at the young age of 23, the mental age was then 19/20 (gasp!) – which by all standards, now that you are 27… is just sick.