I'll be one hairy old woman someday, and I'll still feel like a kid!

So it's my last week as a 25 year old, and this has got me thinking. Not only about the fact that my "early twenties" are over, but about the meaning of ADULTHOOD. What is this word? I can tell you that when I was looking ahead 5 years ago I was confident I'd have it "figured out" by now. I thought I'd be graduated, doing a job I loved, maybe even engaged or married, and these accomplishments would somehow give me a different perspective on life, and what it means to be happy. And what's the truth? I'm still the same person, in many respects. I eat junk food. I don't know what I want to do with my life. I haven't yet graduated. I'm certainly not engaged. What's new? I drink a lot more coffee. I run a lot more miles every week. And I've developed a new hatred for shaving my legs, which is definitely not going to assist me with the engagement thing!! I certainly don't feel like an adult yet. I feel like a coffee buzzed, road running, hairy legged maniac.

So when will I feel like an adult? When I'm a few years older? A few inches taller? (Hope that doesn't happen!) When I have kids? Or when a certain percentage of my income goes to my mortgage?

I brought the idea of "adulthood" up at dinner a few nights ago, and asked a certain 27 year old whether he considered himself to be an adult yet. When he answered no, I asked, "Why not?" After a slew of I don't knows, he said that to him it is all a matter of perspective, and how one views himself. For him, adulthood has a negative connotation. He said he would like to see himself having a wife, and children, and still feeling like a kid on the inside. He would take care of the responsibility of being an adult: the bills, the hard work, the errands, the family, but he would leave out the "taking himself seriously" part. For him, being an adult has this connotation that somehow it's not ok to have fun anymore. You have to forgo the fun in life and exchange it for self righteousness. How awful is that? No wonder we're all extending our "young" adulthoods. If that's what a real adult life is like, someone else can have it.

So, where does that leave me? Is life going to be this perpetual state of adulthood avoidance? Or is adulthood not the actual issue here? Maybe what I'm really looking for, and what's really lacking in my life is inner clarity. Clarity about what my path is in this life, why I'm here, and how I should be spending my days. Clarity about what will really feed my heart, and my body, and my spirit. That's what this illusive adulthood is to me I think. Just a little understanding. A glimpse of truth. And the only place to look for that? Inside one's heart, where you are given everything you need; where you realize that you aren't in control, and that you don't have the answers. Inside, where the real peace resides. Everything else is just details. See? Nothing to worry about after all.