Turning 26

I’m not sure where the days and weeks and months are going.  Why does life do this?  Just speeds up and speeds up – before I know it, I’ll be 80 and wondering where on earth my time went.  How have I already been at my job for four months?  Why, just yesterday I was seeing my best friend in California and enjoying a relaxing drive up Hwy 1.  But the most serious question is this – how, how in the world, do I have a birthday on Friday that will make me closer to 30 than to 20 for the first time? 

I always assumed I’d be one of those women who aged gracefully and without complaint like my grandmothers are.  That when I found a grey hair or a wrinkle, I’d shrug and think, “Well, it happens to everyone.”  Now, I’m not quite so sure I want to go down without a fight. But how does one “age gracefully”?  Is it simply taking care of your body and praying that you don’t get wrinkles as bad as your sun-worshipping counter-parts?  Or is it accepting the changes you know are inevitable and living as though you were still 25? 

My biggest worry, I suppose, is that I am 2 days from turning 26 – at least a quarter through my life – and what have I accomplished on the checklist of what you’re supposed to get done in a life?  This is a chief problem for women my age.  It was clear in our grandparents’ day – even our parents’ day.  You get married right out of high school (or college), you have babies, you take care of said babies, and maybe have a part-time job or some good hobbies that you can fall back on when they grow up.  But now, in this global world, where our options are unlimited – what should our checklist look like?  Part of my inner clock is thinking, “I should be married by now, possibly with a child.”  The other part of my person (the part shaped by the world around me and experiences, not my biological and ancestral instincts) thinks “How lucky am I? I don’t have to worry about a husband or children.  I have no one to tie me down.  I can do and see whatever I’d like.” 

But then, that’s not quite true is it? Because without a husband to help provide for me, I can’t do as much as I’d like.  If I got the kind of job that would allow more traveling or more money, I may have to move out of Charlotte.  And even without a husband and kids, I still have other family that holds me to this town.  How could I leave them all behind? How could I start all over in a new city and make all new friends and only see my family twice a year?  Twice a year?  When I see them at least twice a week now?  It was different when I was studying abroad because the term of my time apart was set.  But were I to take a job in California, for example, who knows how long that would last.

So then you have a 26 year old who is both too independent and too dependent at the same time.  A woman stuck in this weird quagmire of her years in comparison to her heart in comparison to where people think she should be in life. 

Twenty-five was such a great birthday.  I felt like the world was at my feet. I had 25 friends show up and I felt sure the year would hold great, life-changing things.  I guess it did – just not quite the way I planned.  I went to Europe again, which was fantastic.  I spent more time in Spain which I love, love, love!  As well as England, which everyone knows, is my second home somehow.  Yet the problem with this return trip was making the longing to go back ever stronger.  Sometimes, the more you see and experience, the less content you are with the day-to-day.  Or maybe you just want to incorporate all you’ve seen and all the new ideas that have been shared with you into your daily life, but no one else gets it, which makes the implementation of such a life impossible.

Then I met the man I thought I was supposed to marry.  And I thought, “This is perfect – I’m 25, I’ve seen and done a lot, and now I’ve met my soul mate and we can settle down, (but not really because he loves to travel too).  And life with him will be easy and happy because we understand each other.  And in a few years, I’ll have kids and they’ll travel with us and we’ll have tons of amazing photos of them because we’re both photographers.”  Twenty-five was really looking like the best year of my life.

And then, I spent nearly half a year recovering from what was supposed to be the “best year of my life” when he broke my heart into a million little pieces and left me crying on a bench outside Harris Teeter one August evening. Not that big things didn’t continue to happen – they did – but behind it all was a hurt I’d never felt before; and the shattered pieces of a dream that I kept bumping into and cutting myself on. 

I moved into my own place (kind of), and then ended up having to move out in four days when the family suddenly sold their other house.  But for four months, I got to live alone and feel somewhat independent, and that was nice.

My big highlight from the “recovery” period was visiting my friends in California.  That was an amazing trip – there is nothing like new terrain, amazing friends and constant activity to keep you from looking back. 

I also got a full-time job, which I like, but in the end, I know it can’t fulfill me forever.  And I’m still making “poverty level pay” (as my mother likes to put it), despite a four year degree from one of the most prestigious schools in the country.  On the plus side, I’m helping save lives on a daily basis and I’ve gotten over my fear of needles.

So now, here I am, another year older.  And thinking back, it’s been a year of learning, growing and strengthening.  My heart was truly broken for the first time, and I recovered.  Thanks to God and friends and family, I was lent the strength I needed to overcome a mountain.  Compared to that, getting kicked out of my condo and moving into a friend’s guest room within a span of four days was a tiny mole hill.  In fact, it was a year that felt a lot like riding a roller coaster – which is perhaps why it seemed to go by so quickly.  There was one very big drop, and the rest were just ups and downs at break-neck speed.  

And in the end, as I step off the ride, I’m glad I did it.  Not that I would choose to ride again, but I’m glad to say that I did it and lived through it.  And some of it was fun (much like I hear the first half of Tower of Terror is - very cool and interesting, up until have your stomach plummet into your throat as you drop 15 floors straight down). 

So here’s to my 26^th Birthday: may this year hold surprises that help me feel comfortable in this age and satisfied.  May I be brave to make hard decisions and pursue dreams.  May I never stop loving to the fullest of my being, and may I never forget that wearing one’s heart on one’s sleeve isn’t a bad thing. May I never grow cynical and may I always find life’s joys in the world around me.  May I never forget to appreciate the beauty of a Carolina blue sky or a starry night.  May I never grow complacent or defeatist.  And may I always enjoy Disney World as much as I’m about to enjoy it at the end of this month when I go visit.

Did I forget to mention that?  I’m going to Disney!  Yes indeed, my birthday present to myself is visiting Kelly and the kids in Jacksonville, then meeting Michael in Orlando and spending time in the most magical place on earth. Because if there is any place that makes me feel like a kid again, it’s Disney.  Forget the unbelievable amount of money I just spent on passes or the long drive down in my roommate’s car (they are going to FL and dropping me off on the way) – I am going to jump and skip and clap and laugh and hug a giant mouse – just like I did when I was six.