Growin' up

The magic wears off somewhere along the way...

First, its the Tooth Fairy...then we connect those dots to the Easter Bunny (if the tooth fairy isn't real, what kinda bunny hides eggs and gives away money too?)
But, we spare Santa as long as possible to be confirmed as the last lie we've been told throughout childhood.

Our young lives revolve around the stability found within routine--a combination of nurture and nature that allows us to root ourselves in society and develop into the mature, adult trees we will be someday...

Then, we enter high school (the brutality endured during middle school is enough to forego mentioning it here)...

We are star-struck by the giants that own the school...the legends that have paid their dues to finally roam proudly along the grounds stained by their freshman blood, sweat, and tears just four short years ago.

We complete the cycle of awkward and new, to becoming the forgotten middle-child, to being introduced to the stressful world of real-life pressure and competition (SAT's, college), to finally breathing as we embrace the last chapter in our parent's photo albums, already imagining ourselves at our first college party as we park our cars on the first last day of "school."

Independence is that silver lining we all look for.

First, from our parents...
then, from ourselves...

From whatever we have created ourselves to be.

Self-obsessed, self-ignored, financially dependent, lazy, procrastinator, perfectionist, anxious, depressed, worried, doubtful, cynical, optimistic, alone, superficial...

I think my generation is still negotiating who it is. There is so much written these days about the confusion of one's "twenty's..." This epoch has come to confine us more than liberate us. We are overwhelmed because we are one of many instead of many who associate with one idea. We try to highlight our diversity as much as possible in order to get noticed. Then, the man tells us, "you just aren't what we're looking for..."

I yearn to strive for something. My impatience used to interfere with my hunger to conquer and establish myself and what I want...

But, then,

I moved to Spain...where everything closes for a siesta, is closed on Sunday, and I walk everywhere...then,

I moved to the pueblo...
then, I got sick for 5 days in bed, with only myself to care for myself...

I missed Carnaval...a decision that four short years ago, I wouldn't have made. I would have faced the harsh consequences of being sick another five long days in order to be a part of the "party."

I sit here counting down the 4 months I have left until I'm where I'm comfortable... not because of culture, language, customs...no, no, no. Spain has been my home away from home. But, I feel as if I'm stuck in this part of Dr. Seuss's poem:

You can get so confused
that you'll start in to racedown long wiggled roads at a break-necking paceand grind on for miles across weirdish wild space,headed, I fear, toward a most useless place.The Waiting Place...


But, I chose to be here. I am not waiting at all... a bump in the road, then, you're back on your feet:

NO!
That's not for you!

Somehow you'll escape
all that waiting and staying.
You'll find the bright places
where Boom Bands are playing.

Oh, the places you'll go! There is fun to be done!
There are points to be scored.  there are games to be won.
And the magical things you can do with that ball
will make you the winning-est winner of all.
Fame!  You'll be famous as famous can be,
with the whole wide world watching you win on TV.

Believe in yourself and figure out who you are. Sometimes the closer you get to yourself, the further you end up being from everyone else.

That's okay....

That just means you're ahead of the game and closer to where you want to be in life.