Serious Business: A Quarter of a Century Old

((I was about to apologise for the more serious tone of this entry- but who am I kidding, I regret nothing!))

This weekend (Saturday to be exact), I turned 25 years old.

On Friday I travelled to Birmingham, the place of my studies, to stay the weekend at my very good friend's house. Lucia's birthday is always a day after mine, and since we were both turning 25 on the Saturday and Sunday one after another, we decided to celebrate this milestone by throwing a Halloween-themed murder mystery dinner party. We spent Friday preparing the base for the cake (check out this entry on my other blog for pics), decorating the dining area in preparation for a spooky game and three-course dinner, and chilling in general.

Lucia and I spent a bit of time joking about turning 25 and how so many people had been teasing us about becoming 'a quarter of a century old', and how overly dramatic it sounded. Lucia, Peter (Lucia's husband and also another uni friend of mine) and I were drinking tea, eating chocolate and generally chilling out late into the evening, when I glanced at the clock.

It was 23:50.

And suddenly, out of nowhere, I got a tremendous sense of Do Not Want.

Nearly twenty-five years of memories flickered through my mind like someone fast-forwarding a tape, and stopped as suddenly as it came on. I inwardly assessed myself as part of my social network rather than just as an individual, which is so much easier because you're only figuring yourself in the equation. Almost all of my friends and certainly my closest ones are married or attached and discussing marriage or Attached (with a capital A to portray the fact that although marriage isn't on the cards, they'll spend their lives together). Some are mentioning the prospect of children in the now increasingly near future. Hell, it even only took my dear old ex at very most three weeks after jumping our three-year relation-ship ((see what I did there?)) to find the love of his life (evident by the perhaps slightly shameless profile pictures on a certain popular social media site he published before I blocked his arse), which was a fair while ago now (long enough, thankfully, to only feel a twinge of annoyance about the whole thing- although it annoys me further that I still feel a little annoyed, which is inherently annoying).

Where was I now, though? In a stable (I hope) and decent job, but still living with my parents and in my soon-to-be (now current) mid-twenties, steadily but far too painfully slowly saving up for my own place, contentedly unattached- but watching those closest to me beginning to show signs of moving in the realm of having Their Own Life, and even Starting Families.

I suddenly realised what's been eating away at me for a while now: a time is coming when I'm going to be facing a lot of stuff on my own. I'm an only child and my parents, although in largely good health, aren't getting any younger, and whilst my friends will always be there for me and vice versa they will be getting on with their own lives, and dynamics will shift very drastically with children in the mix (which, don't get me wrong, I don't consider a bad thing at all- in fact, I'm quite looking forward to being Auntie Tash and I hope I turn out to be a really fun aunt). But what the fun things we have been doing in our youth and what were going to do on Saturday night- dressing up in ridiculous and cool costumes, painting out faces, drinking bright green appletinis and basically acting our shoe sizes- is soon going to become a thing of the past.

And because I'm contentedly unattached but at the root of things, when I think about it, slow to develop affection towards people even on a friendship-type level, there is every chance that I'll become fun and slightly wacky Auntie Tash who bakes a lot of cake and lives with a load of cats.

(('That's not true!' I hear my friends cry, 'You'll find someone very special to you one day.'))

I snapped out of it- this whole train of thought blinked past in about thirty seconds anyway- and mentioned my determination to do the best I could in life and get the most out of it, even if I never did find my partner in crime in life. Sure enough, my loyal friends told me not to worry, that I'd find Him eventually. I think my friends really do believe that, even if I'm genuinely quite a bit less convinced. We chatted and joked some more.

At the back of my mind I worried though, and I thought: 'Is that all that's important to me? Not being alone? Am I that cowardly?'

I glanced up at the clock again. 00:25. Saturday morning.

"I believe it's my birthday, now," I announced.

I felt the weird, slightly unfamiliar feeling of certainty flood through me.

'No.' I silently answered my own question as my friends and I decided if I should open my card and present now, or after sleeping. I'm not afraid of being alone- at least, not in the grand scheme of things. Yes, it's more than a little scary on a selfish level to see those closest to me levelling up in the game that is Life whilst I feel like I'm floundering far behind everyone else in the starting zone. Yes, the responsibility and duty of being an only child is quite scary, too. And yes, to be completely transparent, it is a tad lonely to not have that special someone who totally gets you to share your life with- I'm a human being, not a honey badger ((for some reason, the honey badger was the first solitary animal I could think of... don't ask, I don't know)). But rather than believing myself to be behind everyone, I began to realise in that instant that I'm not seeing everyone ahead of me- I'm just seeing everyone off to the side.

I'm on a different path- not lagging behind on a singular one. And I don't even want that many cats, anyway.

I suddenly felt a lot better.

The next day we ate chocolate for breakfast, had friends round and dressed up in ridiculous and cool costumes, we painted our faces, we drank appletinis and we ate a stupid amount of cake. I laughed so hard I nearly displaced my kidneys in my corseted Morticia outfit. There is Stuff that is going to be heading my way soon enough, a big chunk of that Stuff I can't even begin to try and predict- but for now, I'll just enjoy being young. After all, I'm still only in my mid-twenties.

~Fin~