Somewhere In Between
Mar. 11th, 2007 11:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trinsyIt hit me last week that I’m closer to being an adult than a child.
Actually, it hit me that I am going to be an adult. The truth is, I never realized it before.
It’s funny, because you spend so much of your childhood talking about “when I grow up.” But I think the thing is that when you’re a child, time drags on so painfully slowly (I can’t tell you when it starts to speed up to scarily fast; it seems like one day you wake up and the more recent half of your life all squeezed itself into yesterday). And I think that you spend so much time (I’m finishing up my eighteenth year of it, currently) talking about becoming an adult that you stop believing it’s actually going to ever happen. It’s like it turns into one of those ridiculous daydreams that’s fun to toy around with, but is too far out of reach to ever be a danger of becoming a reality.
Only I realized last week that it is going to become reality. I am not going to be a kid forever. I’m not going to go to school for the rest of my life. And even though I complain about it and always say that I wasn’t meant to be a student, the truth is that school is all I’ve ever known, and the thought of not having that as the constant in my life is more terrifying than anything else I can imagine.
One day I will buy a house. One day I will have to pay bills. One day I will have to make myself dinner with groceries I went to the store and bought with money I made from the grown-up job I have in the career I chose.
One day I am going to be just like the adults that surround me. The only thing more frightening than the thought that every adult was once a child is the idea that every child is {barring tragedy} going to become an adult. I mean, I’ve always known that this is what happens, but I’ve never really understood it. It seems like I’ve watched everyone around me going through this cycle – all this bother of growing up – and I’ve stayed just the same.
And I can’t decide anymore if I’m a kid playing at being an adult or an adult playing at being a kid.
Actually, it hit me that I am going to be an adult. The truth is, I never realized it before.
It’s funny, because you spend so much of your childhood talking about “when I grow up.” But I think the thing is that when you’re a child, time drags on so painfully slowly (I can’t tell you when it starts to speed up to scarily fast; it seems like one day you wake up and the more recent half of your life all squeezed itself into yesterday). And I think that you spend so much time (I’m finishing up my eighteenth year of it, currently) talking about becoming an adult that you stop believing it’s actually going to ever happen. It’s like it turns into one of those ridiculous daydreams that’s fun to toy around with, but is too far out of reach to ever be a danger of becoming a reality.
Only I realized last week that it is going to become reality. I am not going to be a kid forever. I’m not going to go to school for the rest of my life. And even though I complain about it and always say that I wasn’t meant to be a student, the truth is that school is all I’ve ever known, and the thought of not having that as the constant in my life is more terrifying than anything else I can imagine.
One day I will buy a house. One day I will have to pay bills. One day I will have to make myself dinner with groceries I went to the store and bought with money I made from the grown-up job I have in the career I chose.
One day I am going to be just like the adults that surround me. The only thing more frightening than the thought that every adult was once a child is the idea that every child is {barring tragedy} going to become an adult. I mean, I’ve always known that this is what happens, but I’ve never really understood it. It seems like I’ve watched everyone around me going through this cycle – all this bother of growing up – and I’ve stayed just the same.
And I can’t decide anymore if I’m a kid playing at being an adult or an adult playing at being a kid.
