But seriously, I blinked and now I'm a month away from being 21. The age where you're supposed to get loaded and make mistakes and wake up with your underpants on your head on the Campus Loop shuttle going round, and round, and round. Except that I've done a rather unfortunate amount of things similar to that over the years, so I may end up chauffeuring some of my still-boozing friends around for them to drink. Such is the absurdity my life has become.
So what has happened to me as of late? Well first, I'm an anthropology major. What that really means is that I've switched to another thing that would typically have me living in a cardboard box to the same extent as my previous major, except for the fact that I actually like this one.
Also, except for the living in a cardboard box part.
Yup, this girl already has a fallback job lined up for when she graduates. In this bleak economic time, you should indeed be impressed. One that pays above the poverty line, and where I get to work in a shiny new building! It's all really quite exciting...except for the fact that I haven't said yes for sure yet.
This is for several reasons. One is that I have been given advice from numerous dependable people telling me not to sell myself short. Some think that my subconscious forethought to work my butt off through high school and college may actually be able to put me in a better job, with better pay.
The second reason is because well...what if I want to do something else? What if I want to work in a restaurant for a little while or study the contraband and errorist movements in Argentina or make tiny cute shit to sell on Etsy like "teeny the teacup"?
teeny comes in many other colors and is my new best friend.
The final reason is because of my boyfriend. There's that whole living together, it-depends-on-what-he's-doing thing.
Which is...well, scary.
Because even in those moments where you feel totally at ease, or absurd, or carefree (incidentally, right now he's sitting on the floor in his underwear eating tri-tip and making faces at me) you realize that being committed is scary.
Facing the possibility that you may in fact be in the room with the person you want to spend the rest of your life with.
I mean...am I ready? I ask myself this all the time. I don't have a job, I don't know what the hell I'm really going to do with my life. I fumble my way through every day and I have a ton of responsibility already...but somehow I don't feel ready for a lot of this stuff. I mean fuck, I'm twenty years old. At least for another 24 days, I'm not even old enough to buy my own freaking bottle of wine. Yet worrying about another entire person?! I don't even have my shit together yet.
But then sometimes, there are moments--like right now, when he's sitting on the floor, dirty and sweaty in his underwear, shoving down tri-tip and chugging my apple juice--when you just kind
of know. If it works, it works, right?
I may not be ready for a lot of things. But I think...I think I'm ready for this.
