Grown.

Have you ever met someone who is the same age as you, but seems to be at a totally different space in their life? At thirty three, I am starting to be in the minority when it comes to my youthful ways. People my age have kids. Marriages. Watch dramas on TV. Wear sensible clothing. Don't get stoned and go to the zoo at least once a year. I've had a bit of a personal journey over the last few months. Rectifying my age with my lifestyle, so to speak.

The baby-face and lack of stature are mostly to blame, but I hear it at least twice a week. You are NOT in your thirties, they say. Yet, here I am. I have a mortgage and pets that are well provided for. I have had the same high-stress job for almost ten years. When I'm submitting payment for my phone bill, you better believe I feel like a grown up. And yet, I give exactly one million fucks about the fact that they replaced all solid Cracker Jack prizes with paper puzzles and stickers (maaaaan, funk that).

There have been some things from my younger years I have learned to release. My teenybopper ways took a sharp nose-dive as soon as I learned Jonathan Taylor Thomas was a pro-lifer. Ain't no bigger boner-killer than being starkly against a woman's right to choose. My Tiger Beats went out the window with my dream journals and wishing stones. What didn't go out the window were my sneaker collection, my penchant for cookies with a sassy bear on the label, my adoration of blue freeze pops, and my first-name basis with the clerk at the candy store.

Sure, I may still go out drinking until all hours of the night, pick the black jellybeans out of the candy dish, watch almost exclusively cartoons, and run through sprinklers, but I'm growing up on MY terms over here, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

~sarah p.