Essence.com: Do You Feel Your Age?
Monday, July 16, 2012 at 11:24AM Over the weekend, I read a great story on Clutch, “Help, I’m Stuck in My 20s.” Writer Alisha Tillery lamented that at 31 she was “well past the age of being a bona fide adult,” but somehow didn’t feel very grown up.
“Yes, by society’s standards, I am an adult,” she wrote. “I work… I pay all of my bills independently. I take my trash out every week, contribute to charities… But in my mind, sometimes I’m still that oblivious 23-year-old looking for the next good time.”
It’s a conundrum I’ve found myself in on a few occasions. In my early twenties, I had perhaps a misguided definition of what “real” adulthood is. From my perspective everyone over 30 was pulled together, mature and focused. So you can imagine that when I hit 30, I wondered, “What is wrong with me?” I’d accomplished several goals and was on my way to accomplishing more, but somehow I didn’t have that got-it-all-together feeling that I’d perceived in others. I was 30 and still happily hitting (and enjoying) the club, wasting weekends at boozy brunches and having water balloon fights in parks. I was city (and continent) hopping and sleeping past noon, just like I did in college. My apartment — not house — still wasn’t (and isn’t) fully furnished. I wasn’t married, nor was I looking to be. I couldn’t pass up a good party. I still daydreamed at my desk about what I’d do when I grew up.
I was fully grown by nearly all standards, but when I talked to my friends in their early twenties, I noticed that while I may have had less drama than some, our lifestyles were nearly identical. On paper, I was 30; in my mind I was closer to 23, maybe 25 on a responsible day. This wasn’t how things were supposed to play out.
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