I. I turn 27 in two months. This feels very old to me. I don’t give a whit about astrology, but it’s hard to ignore those timeless signs of imminent major life changes.
II. I was thinking about my twenty-third year a few days ago and how awful that time in one’s life is. A second adolescence, without all the innocence and simplicity of the first; add to that, genuine adult concerns.
III. I sat at lunch, feeling as weary as I might at the end of a day. I had no appetite to eat, so I drank a can of Sprite.
One young woman said to the other, “Are things any better?”
“No,” answered the other one, a slight waver of fretfulness in her voice.
“It’s the twenty-fifth year,” said the first. ”I told you. It’s the worst.”
IV. Honestly, it’s amazing that anybody manages to make it through their life without doing anything totally stupid or ending up completely miserable.
There’s this great moment in An Education where Carey Mulligan’s character visits someone from her old life (I’m really trying hard not to give anything away). And when the person tells her, “You’re so young,” she responds, “I feel old.” And you believe her.
We all have moments like that.
“I just feel like you have to know someone for at least a few years before you even consider a big commitment,” she says, keeping her eyes on the road. The rain mists over the windshield.
I agree.
“He’s my first real boyfriend,” she continues. ”I mean, I dated a few guys in college, but that was just…I mean, that wasn’t even for real.” She tosses her hair aside. ”Of course, I was totally in love with them.” She laughs, and now she sounds more like she’s thinking to herself than talking to me. ”When I think back on them now…God.”
“I thought you were just looking for a little make-out action,” she writes.
I respond, “I’ve been over that for a while. It’s not really worth my time.”
“You’re growing up. How boring.”
But I disagree—not on her assertion, but on its verb tense. I’ve been grown for a while. I think I was grown from the moment I stepped in front of a class of twenty-two eighth graders and realized I was responsible for their education for a full 180 days of instruction.
Teaching is parenting. Full stop. Most of my students probably see me more than their own families, and when I was in school, I certainly spent more time at school than at home. Not that the teacher should ever replace or supplant the parent. But to be a good teacher, you need some of the qualities of an excellent parent: quicksilver decision-making skills, foresight, heart, the ability to say no, and the presence of mind to recognize when to say, “Well, okay.”
I don’t call my family for help. I haven’t asked them for money since before graduation. I know what I want to do with my life. To me, I define that as “grown.”
What do you define as “grown”?
squashed:
The population of Pakistani civil engineering grad students at the University of Illinios is split about evenly down the middle between those who hate Pervez Musharraf and those who, being sponsored by the Pakistani military, love Musharraf.
They take it out over cricket matches.
University of Illinois engineering grad students find time to leave Grainger, like, ever? This I gotta see to believe!
