Thursday, November 21, 2013

Age is just a number...

As most of my friends and I quickly approach an "age milestone (30)" (some of you have already met said milestone, I still have just under a year ;-P) I am left to ponder what age really means. Literally it means the passage of time...the time we have lived thus far on Earth. But what does it really mean for us as people?

I've been mulling over this question for some time now. The more I watch people, the more discouraging the answer seems. Sometimes what I see makes me very sad. As people get older they tend to lose their spark, that little something that makes you, you. (This is a blanket statement of course, not everyone is like this it just seems most people are.) The passage of time seems to pull faces down and flatten out emotions. It extinguishes passion, kills joy and dampens excitement. And if you don't succumb to these hallmarks then you are seen as "immature" or "unstable." At least that is what I have gleaned from my observations. And that is a fate I am unwilling to accept for myself, not anymore.

One of the things I have found beneficial about aging is becoming comfortable with myself. I never really have been before now. I didn't have the greatest childhood and I experienced many things most people don't experience as an adult, let alone a child. I was forced to grow up quickly and never felt like I had much of a childhood. I spent most of my teen years completely insecure and closed off, finding it incredibly difficult to relate to others and make friends. At times I suffered from extreme bouts of depression and self loathing. It was not a fun way to grow up. 

A lot of my twenty's has been spent hiding. Hiding my personality, hiding my interests but mostly hiding my emotions. It made me very angry and resentful. I have spent so much of my life caring too much about what other people think about me and not caring enough about what I think about me. I've spent so much time smothering my emotions and numbing myself to everything. I haven't pursued interests for fear of what others would think and I haven't explored passions for fear of rejection. I've tried to fall in line with what everyone else expects of me without a care for what I really felt and for a long time I lost what it meant to even feel. And do you know what all of that worry about other people's opinions or worrying about whether or not I fit in got me? A bag full of regrets and a wealth of wasted time and opportunity. 

But I suppose it wasn't all for nothing because it did teach me some things. Within the last year I have learned to really accept myself, warts and all. I've learned that I have a voice worth hearing, an opinion worth sharing and most importantly that I am worth something. I've never really felt this way before and it's wonderful. I have adopted a "fuck it" attitude and dived head first into the things I love. And you know what? For the first time I feel like I am learning what living really means. I am learning what it means to be really happy or really excited or even really sad. I am also discovering that I would rather spend my life loving fully, laughing loudly, crying when I need to and draining every drop of emotion out of whatever it is I'm going through than spend it worrying about what other people think I should be doing. Or worrying about being what other people think I should be. I am me and that is enough. It's also pretty damn awesome.

So what does age mean? It means I have been alive for 29 years and some odd months. That's all. I won't let a number define who I am. I won't let it define my interests or cage my passions. I define who I am. And I am Marcie. I love YA novels even though I am not a young adult because they have more feeling than most adult books. I listen to music extremely loud because I want to feel it and not just hear it. And no I don't care if I look like a psycho driving around singing and dancing. It makes me happy. Obscenely inappropriate things make me laugh and they probably always will. I love tattoos and say too many curse words. I love to give people hugs and I say a lot of awkward things in conversation sometimes. I can't help it. If I make you uncomfortable then I'm sorry. If you find me lacking then kindly, fuck off because I am ready to start living my life for myself and we'll see where that takes me. And remember friends that age is just a number. It's not a milestone by which to judge maturity or anything else because let's face it. We only get to go around one time. How do you want to spend yours? 

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