I'm 28. I suppose this is that time in a person's life where they become just a tad bit more self-reflective and start thinking a bit more about who we are, why we are, and what we want to do with ourselves. For real real. I can see that ominous 30 coming around the corner but I'm not there yet, thank you. I'll cling to my 20's as long as I can. On the other hand, I don't quite feel like I belong to "those 20-somethings" anymore. I'm too old to be associated with those 21-year olds, that's for sure.
A couple of things set me into that mind set. I recently made friends with a young, 22-year old guy. Now, it pains me to say "young" in reference to a 22-year old, but the reality is that with my 6 additional years of experience in this life, I can for certain say the guy is young. Now, I can get past the jokes where I say I loved a certain song in high school, and he says something typical like he was only in elementary. Whatever, that's not a big deal. It's when I see the complete uncertainness in this person and lack of self-assuredness that I thank the heavens that I'm not 22 any more.
He does serve a big function for me though: I'm not afraid of 30 anymore. 30, even though it's two years away, isn't scary now because it means a few more years of life under my belt, a few more experiences, a few more lessons learned and a few more friends to cherish. Going forward isn't as scary to me as thinking back to being 20, and being completely scared yet trying to put an air of confidence out to the world.
8 years ago, I was still trudging through college, trying to decide if what I was doing in college was the right thing for me to do. I was struggling to identify who I was and how I wanted to show that to the world. I was fighting to understand what it meant to be a man, to be gay, to be a (mostly) southern boy, to love rock music, to love someone other than myself, and how to do all those things at once. I sometimes wonder how I came out of that mess sober in any respect! But I did, and I'm glad for the experience, but I'm even happier I never have to go back.
Now, when I talk to friends that have recently turned 30, I get a lot of the same sense of things. They all enjoyed their 20's for what they were worth, maybe a few regrets here and there, but if being a pompous, self-indulging 20-something will teach you anything, it's that regrets are completely worthless. All you can do it learn from it and move on.
I'm lucky to have the man I love in my life to share this time in our lives together. My boyfriend has been a blessing and a wonder, wrapped in a delicious shell of love served with a side of adorableness. It seems that we are going through a lot of the same progressions together, and many different ones as well, but he's always been by my side to offer up his best, and there's really nothing more I could ask for.
Then there's all my peers, my friends that are the same age as I am. It's fun to watch us all reach this point where we know that maybe we can't stay out and play like we did 6, 7, 8 years ago, but we're damn well still going to try! And sure, maybe we know that our scene is changing a bit, maybe we're conscious of the subtle differences in our lives now versus even 5 years ago, but you catch one of us admitting that's because we're getting older. Rather, it's because we've grown to better understand things. Hell, I know most of my friends are turning 24 this year… for the third of fourth time.
So what's this all meant to say? That I'm happy for where I'm at and I hope things only get better from here.
No comments:
Post a Comment