Age-wise, there aren't a whole lot of guarantees...besides the given fact that you will be pleasant until around age eleven, you'll erase 11-15 from your memory, then at sixteen, will re-start from age ten.
It's a fun time.
But, as we've previously epiphany-ed, you don't wake up on your 18 birthday, put on your suit and realize "oh! Everything makes sense!"
Obviously, if that happened, there would be a lot more calorie-free ice cream.
We tend to get overly warned that teenagers will be unpredictable...this usually lends itself to chaotic hair on top of chaotic minds. But this rebellious unpredictability almost becomes predictable, as society keeps making us predict it.
Glad you're coming with me on that one.
But nobody tells us that the older you get, the less predictable you become. I mean, who would ever guess that the high school rock star is now your stock broker? Or that a former hippie becomes an English professor (welcome to my family, folks)? In the book Juliet, Naked, a reclusive musician looks like "a guy you'd be happy to buy insurance from." We follow these paths that are not so much age-based, rather they're "what the hell am I doing with my life?" based.
What's really baffling though, is that while you can read that your two year old will learn the word "no," and that you want to hide in your closet as soon as your kid blows out thirteen candles, college-age seems to be highly divided. There's going to be some major generalizations here, but I've noticed a trend between 18-23 year olds who are still kids, and those who sit around cafés talking about Freud's iceberg theory and health care plans.
In the course of one afternoon, I've spoken to two eighteen year olds. One conversation went something like:
[trying to pry open a water bottle] "Why is this so hard?"
"That's what she said!"
"In the ashram, we just avoided water bottles."
"You went ass-romping? What?"
The second was like this:
"Do you think art has less of an impact if a lot of people know about it?"
"I was just thinking the same thing when looking at famous paintings in Spain!"
At nineteen, people seem to categorize you as either "too immature," or "wise beyond your years." You're not a kid, but it's a little extreme to jump out of bed, start filing your taxes and being called things like "ma'am."
If there's one way to feel old, it's being called "ma'am."
So when someone tells a kind-of-adult-but-not-really to "act their age" what exactly does that mean? I'm expected to go to school have some sort of employment, but what about during un-structured time? I'd probably get some weird looks if I took out a coloring book or started a stuffed animals collection. But it's a bit of a stretch to map out retirement plans.
Also, no one ever tells you that when someone asks your age, you will start to say "sixteen," then realize that time didn't stop for three years. Oops.
Namaste.
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