Like most fairytale-loving kids, I never wanted to grow up. The idea that growing up meant becoming a responsible, reliable, and problem-solving person out of necessity was sickening. When you’re a child it’s whimsical to do responsible things on impulse, because you can go play after. Nowadays, at 20, to play is to be rewarded, and by what? Finishing tasks? Meeting deadlines? Having such little anxiety or imposter syndrome or so much stress and fatigue that you finally just stop studying? The feeling of never doing enough follows me around like a bouncy child asking “Are we there yet?”.
It’s strange how such precious parts of childhood translate so badly into adulthood. And that makes sense, you can’t put a square peg in a round hole. Movies about babies taking over the world don't rise to fame very often, not because no one would care for the story, but because it would be incredibly cringey to watch the downfall of society happen for avoidable reasons. We already endure enough of that on this planet. Children just can't do adult things, so we grow into our parent's age as the next generation takes our place.
Another driving force of struggling to be an adult is rebelling against your parents after leaving home. It’s nice to do things and think “Hehe my parents don’t know what I’m up to”... but they probably suspect it anyway. It’s a great, wonderful, instinctive thing that I wouldn’t take away from anyone (of sound mind and in a healthy headspace/lifestyle) and one of the few natural behaviors that you bring with you from childhood.
It’s funny that we carry so much resentment for aging in this society, kids and elderly alike, but as young adults, we dream up blissful futures and yearn desperately for our childhoods. Born in 2004, I was set to graduate high school in 2022, which I was subconsciously reminded of for a decade when I logged into school accounts with my username ending in “2022.” I was shocked when New Year’s Eve of 2022 came around and I had to envision a world after 2022. I don’t think this tunnel vision was necessarily due to self-absorption, rather it stemmed from the fact that for our childhoods we count down until age 18. Let me add too that senior depression is the most valid thing in the world, regardless of how messy it manifests itself in your life. It’s a hot stewy pot of life in shambles. It just happens, for what feels like an eternity but once it's over it's kind of buried in the past, upstaged by newfound freedom.
All these losses are justified by gaining freedom from the bubble of our families and strict grade schools. We essentially plan our lives around an impending loss, which can be depressing. But this freedom isn’t the enemy. It’s just as beautiful as the tether you carried to your sources growing up, but it is something to succumb to, and that can be intimidating. Even after the fact, you wonder if you made the right choices and anticipate if a life-altering epiphany will hit you. It’s weird knowing that your life is panning out by the choices of a teenager, and good to give yourself a lot more grace than you want to. Life genuinely terrifies me sometimes, and the more I try to stay level-headed, the less connected I feel. I think a copious amount of dwelling and dreaming is the key to accepting the present day. My mantras for two years have been so “now”-oriented that I forget where I came from sometimes!