Age

I don't really feel like an adult most days.

I know I've been working every day for 4 years now. I know I pay my own rent and health care and utilities. I know I buy my own groceries and drive myself to the hospital for tests.

But I don't feel like an adult.

I'm reading Cocktails for Three right now. One of the lead characters has a baby. The baby is hysterical until her mother feeds her. Then she's happy. I'm finding myself jealous of that fictional baby. The thought of not worrying about anything other than eating and being loved. But then, I suppose, that's all I really worry about now. Working to make money to feed myself and finding true love.

But it gets much more complicated with age.

I wonder if I'll ever find true love. I wonder if I'll have children at all. I wonder at what point I'll stop looking for the one and give up on having a child. I dwell often on the fear that I won't have children. That's a horrible thought to me. I think I'd rather die then live until 85 with no children.

But there's so much more I have to do before I can have children.

I have to find a man I want to marry. I have to start paying for my own car insurance and Banana Republic bills and vacations. I have to get an MBA and lose 10 pounds and see Spain and Russia.

And I hate this anxiety. I hate taking blood pressure medicine at 26. I hate looking in the mirror and realizing that my skin isn't as dewey as it was when I was 21. That my boobs aren't as perky as they were at 22. That my optimism isn't as bright as it was at 23.

I'm angry. Angry at age and time and myself. Angry at Jerk for taking away 3 years of my life. Angry at my soulmate for not finding me yet. Angry at fate for not bringing me love.

It's no way to spend your life. It drives you mad.

And I know, I've got many years to go. I've got plenty of time left on biological clock. But some days, I wake up to the thought that it's been another week or month or year. I wake up to the thought that time is flying by. That people are getting engaged and married and having children. That I'm still here in this body not sure if I'm 18 or 26. Worried about wrinkles and my take on plastic surgery. Hugging the diamond earrings my parents gave me, because I might never get a pair from the man I'm supposed to fall in love with.

And frankly, age sucks. It's not enough that you don't appear the same; you don't look at anything the same again. You've made all the important decisions about where you should go to college and what your interests and hobbies will be. You can't go back and become a high school athlete or cheerleader. You have to take the artistic you who appeared in plays and painted pictures and wrote for the newspaper instead. You have to take the sorority you rushed with great enthusiasm and deaffiliated from with an even greater enthusiasm. You have to be who you've become. It's not the best feeling.