#twentysomethings

***Disclaimer- to anyone who might be slightly annoyed at a 22 year old saying they feel old… this is not for you***  Similarly, if you like structure- this is a very stream of consciousness free flowing post.***

Upon jumping into the “real world” of having a job, a home, and money in the bank- I’ve weirdly felt angsty.  Evener weirder is the fact that I’m mainly angsty about there being nothing to be angsty about- everything just seemed a bit too put-together.

Through the ambiguity of these feeling I have deciphered that they’ve been about growing up and feeling a bit too mature for my age, but it wasn’t until becoming obsessed with an MTV teen dram/com that I figured out exactly what this feeling was about: freshness and pessimism.  

During the past 4 or 5 days, I’ve watched all 31 aired episodes of “Awkward.” It is a show about a high school- friendships, love, popularity, parents, and more.  It is the perfect encapsulation of the emotions a lot of kids go through between 15 and 18, and it felt very real.  Over the course of my forcibly short (I now have to wait for new episodes to air) but intense obsession, I realized something beautiful about that time in life- the wonderful and dynamic late-teens- and how I miss it- the freshness of everything and the pessimism that this freshness brings.

In the late teens, so many new things are happening on a much more intense and personal scale: falling in love, developing deeper friendships, new relationships with parents, and thinking of the future but having nothing to judge it by.  It is all fresh and exciting and we don’t know how to deal with it and it feels so important because it has never happened before.  Everything is life changing because the late teens are really when life is beginning.  

And because everything is new, everything feels unique… and lasting. But when we see that all of it actually isn’t, then the pessimism comes. We haven’t known anything else and so when the breakup comes, or graduation, or moving or anything else - we feel as if the world is ending, life will never be the same, and we will NOT be okay.  Just as the joy of newness had overtaken us so recently, the burn of loss does too.

But the truth is (and in the late teens we are told this constantly but never believe it, and any teen reading this now will not believe it either)- the truth is it will all be okay.  Another love, another school, another friendship will happen and fill our time and our thoughts and our hearts. A sad month will be just a month in a pool of many and similarly a happy day will be part of a mental collage that makes us smile.

Of course, it doesn’t erase what was before or what was first, and the feeling of that newness will never be forgotten- it will be looked back on as magical- so encompassing and wonderful and frightening, but most of all- fleeting. 

Life is like a puzzle- each person, place, and experience that we encounter is a piece.  Some grow in size or hold an ever-important place, and others shrink to obscurity as more are added.  The hard part is when you feel like you can’t control that shrinking, when without knowing you lose the connection to what used to be so important and when you can’t feel the same joys in the same way.

I think my angst is because new things are happening and things are changing… and I don’t really care.  It feels normal.  My life has been change for so long.  I’m not phased.  And though I’m excited- I’m not amazed.

A new city is a new city, a new friend is a new friend, a new fact is a new fact- it is all exciting and I’m learning and I’m growing and I feel my future becoming increasingly meaningful and important, but it isn’t the same all-encompassing joy or fear like that of the late teens.  But it is a new feeling, and I’m eager to explore this feeling as well.  There is something pleasant about knowing the wounds will heal, that people will stay in touch, and that life does go on.

That’s the important part of this post- it isn’t emo, or trying to say that the late teens are the most important part of one’s life (how could a 22 year old make that statement anyway) but what I’ve realized is how special that time is.  How treasured the freshness and the pessimism should be kept.

All moments in life need to be appreciated, and often it is easiest to do that in retrospect.  I’m not sure what is best though- is it nicer to be swept away in the moment and only realize how astonishing it is later?  Does reflecting in the “now” take away from the now- or complement it?  

… If there is a show that answers that, let me know.