Do I Have To?

Dear People of the Land of Buckets,

I'm kind of freaking out again. But this time it's all sorts of internal shmuh. As I result, I am going back to my childhood and being as irresponsible as possible. I'm holding onto the last shred of childhood possible. Because its ending. I need to grow up. I need to be an adult. At least that is what the calender is telling me. This week the calender is yelling at me. "It's time to grow up!" "Stop being childish!" "You will never be young again!" "You're turning 25!"

Ok, lets be honest, 25 isn't "old". I'll save that title for the dear people I love who are 69 and 68. That's old (Love you, Dad and Mom ;) But to me, 25 is also a milestone. It's like the end of your childhood. I mean, I've legally been an adult for 3 years already, but most 21-year-olds are still pretty immature. In my eyes, once you were 25 you needed to be a true adult. Be mature. Know what you are doing with your life. Be all settled down. Wear your hair up in a bun and get that little chain that makes it so you can't lose your glasses. Be almost done with college. Things like that.

These options don't really work for me. I wasn't thinking, and I cut my hair so it's too short to put in a bun. I hate those little chain things. I'm not almost done with real college. I haven't even applied for the school I want to go to for my bachelor's yet. As for being settled down.... Yeah right! HA!

I had a vision of where my life would be when I was 25. I am SO not there. Don't get me wrong, I am very happy with where my life is going, and what I have done. I have had some great experiences. But as my birthday gets closer and closer, I find that I have kind of been holding onto those ideals. Those childhood dreams. I'm pretty sure there is no way that in the next 4 days I can get my bachelors, get married and have at least one child. It's ok that I don't have those things, but it is time to change my dreams. To realize that the old dreams didn't happen, but my life is good. I am happy. I just tend to cling, and then I turn 25 and have a quarter-life crisis. If I were rich, I'd go out and buy some really sweet red car. (Ok, I think that's what men do with their mid-life crisis, but I have no idea what women do so I'm stealing the men's idea. Besides, who doesn't want a really sweet red car? Ok, I don't want red... maybe... silver!)

So, here is the plan. On Friday, I don't care what the calender says. I am turning 23 again. I kind of feel like I missed that year, cause I was on my mission for the whole thing. I didn't do any cool "real-life" things that year. So I'm taking that year back!

Oh, and on a somewhat unrelated note: I like to do strange things to myself on my birthday. At least I have for the past 3 years. And I'm out of ideas. Let me tell you what I've done: Year 22: I dyed my hair red. Year 23: I started waxing my eyebrows (that was a really good idea). Year 24: I got a Henna tattoo. Year 25: ??? I've got nothing.

Any suggestions?