let's rewind

the boys at rehoboth

While you got a little look at what beach week was, I feel like I have to say something about how it felt. Because let’s be real, I’m all about the analysis of daily life with this vacation and it just wouldn’t be me without some sort of thought process going.

Do you ever have those moments when you feel every bit of your age? I know what you are thinking. You’re thinking, “For heaven’s sake, here is this twenty-four year old complaining about being old.” I get it. More than that, I know it. I’m a baby; a child; I know nothing. It seems like every time I lay my head down at night more knowledge seeps out, particularly in the art history part of the brain--I honestly was blanking on Tiffany lamp knowledge the other day—the horrors! But here I was, surrounded by six 17 year olds, tiny babies, not yet seniors in high school and I felt that seven year age difference. They looked at me with distaste when I cracked a joke, they-gasp-did not find me funny. I was not to be included in any conversation, no advice was sought when it came to girls (and note: as a boy/guy/dude do not seek advice from other boys/guys/dudes under the age of 25, that advice will not head well with the ladies, turn to the three girls to your left and they will shed light on why your girlfriend does not find it witty and charming that your friend wrote a fart joke on your wall and insists that in the five days you are apart you at least send her one text message).

Don’t get me wrong; I grew to greatly like this group. They are good guys, they are funny, they have pretty good taste in TV, they want to go to college and do meaningful things with their life. They treat their girlfriends well and remembered to buy a gift.   

But for me, I think it was one of the first, of many I’m sure, times when I realized where I wasn’t.

As much as high school seems like yesterday, and college a second ago, those things are part of my past. High school finished six years ago, college two. I’m an alumnus of those institutions, not a student. I have friends with jobs, retirement plans, and tenure in their futures. While I may feel like I’m stuck in the daunting abyss of post grad life (and I admit, I’m not the only one), I am also embarking on the future that those 17 year olds dare to dream about. Their future is my present. I made it. I survived the SATs, graduation, finals, seminars, long papers, boring professors, internships, and the first (couple) rounds of job applications. I’ve been abroad and I’ve come back. These are the things I dreamed about; that was my future.

So I guess we are just back to the ever-consuming question of WHAT IS NEXT?

And I guess my dilemma evolves to: can you really enjoy the moment well enough to let whatever comes next just come?

There were multiple times at the beach where I thought about being seventeen again. I mean, I don’t really think I’d want to do it again, but it entered my thoughts. Not because things were easier, or high school was awesome, but because 24 was so far away. And now its not. It’s right here. Looking at me. Probably judging what I’m doing with it.

I guess I’ve begun the feeling of disconnect between how old I am and how old I feel. How can it be that already I’m thinking of going backward? Back to a time of bedtimes and curfews and juice boxes with straws. Is this only the beginning?

And yes, we can debate how all of this is totally and completely normal. How there are tons of people everywhere everyday feeling perplexed over their next steps. I get that. I hear you.

But it still leaves me thinking.

I watch this show called The Conversation. It’s awesome. I will write about its complete awesomeness at another moment. Just like John Lipton, a la Actor’s Studio, at the end of the show each person is asked the same four questions. One of them is, “What would you tell your fourteen year old self?”

I can think of a couple of things I would tell her. And none of them seems as important as wondering what she would tell me. Maybe she’d like where I’m at, but for some small reason I have this notion that there would be something else she’d say. Something maybe I don’t want to hear, and yet have to know, as if it would change the very path I’m walking. (And know I realize I am undoubtedly giving that girl way too much power. Right? That’s what you’re thinking?)

Blah.

After this, I need some chocolate.

And you…thoughts?