Always growing, never older

"Nobody feels like an adult. It's the world's dirty secret."

I've written about Josh Radnor's Liberal Arts before. Because he is one of my favorite directors, his works hold a special place in my heart - not just as a mode of entertainment, but as an existential telescope through which I can peer into my life: past, present and future.

Radnor's (two) movies have managed to make me rethink my life in various ways. I haven't made any drastic decisions as a result, but I do believe that it's little influences - like a line in a film or the feeling you get watching two characters fall in love on screen and then have to let go - that give you a much more dynamic perspective on how you live. This time it was a quote.

It's always troubled me that I haven't been able to properly grow up. I'm very much a child at heart. This manifests itself in a love for Disney (movies, theme parks, music, television, etc.) and a passion for other children's media texts. Those things may put me in a different class from the rest of my age group, but they don't necessarily alienate me from humanity. On the other hand, as I've realized recently, I have a tendency to take on a childlike notion of dependency in times of need.

I'm in a time of need right now.

Due to the fault of no one in particular - except perhaps me - I've been allowing myself to feel depressed about issues that I would rather just let go of. I've turned to friends, confidantes, family (specifically my dad and my grandma), in the hopes that their little sage pieces of advice would help me through trauma and pain, leading me into a better tomorrow.

My expectations have been met, of course, because I've been lucky enough to be surrounded for most of my life by numerous people who care about me. But I feel that, despite the love I feel and my recent efforts toward empowerment, I still don't necessarily have the ability to strengthen myself on my own terms.

And it's because, as Liberal Arts reminded me, I'm not an adult. Or at least I don't like to treat myself as one, nor do I usually believe I am one.

In many ways, naïveté guides my life. It doesn't often burden me, because I think of it as a way of being more in touch with my inner child - something I've never been ashamed of. Yet I can't help but feel terrible that in my time of need, I can't look inwardly, but rather I must look outwardly. Is this an affliction that only I possess?

I know so many strong people, so many wonderfully intelligent people, who don't rely on others to confirm their thoughts, to help them through rough spots. They deal with their own problems and they come up with their own solutions.

So why have I never been able to possess that ability myself?

Well, I could explain this on the grounds that I'm not an adult. I don't feel like an adult. I don't treat myself like an adult. I don't expect to be treated like an adult. I may be 20, but when I interact with others I still strangely expect them to deal with me as if I'm younger, more delicate, more impressionable.

This can't be reconciled with humanity. Once you're 20, you no longer look or act or speak like a toddler. Therefore, you can't get by as one. I think I'm learning that - slowly.

This occurred to me a lot when I was in London during the fall and early winter months, especially when dealing with money. If I was counting change in front of someone working a register, I'd feel ridiculous. I'd rifle through my wallet, talking to myself as I reasoned about whether a coin was worth five or ten pence. It was frustrating and it made me feel infantile.

In so many areas of my life, I feel like I'm in need of maturation. Physically and emotionally, I always see areas of improvement. I never feel like I've peaked, like I've reached an acceptable level of adulthood. And it makes me feel like I'm alone, functioning in a world that inexplicably makes sense to everyone but me.

Here's where I come back to that quote - the one at the top of this entry. In Liberal Arts, the protagonist, Jesse's, mentor (Professor Peter Hoberg), is in conversation with him when he makes this blanket statement. I'll remind you of it: "Nobody feels like an adult. It's the world's dirty secret." He tries to explain to Jesse that his age and his level of self-awareness may seem frighteningly mismatched, but this is a problem that everyone faces. It's not just his issue.

Am I to believe this? Granted, Josh Radnor wrote this screenplay. It came from his mind, and it doesn't necessarily reflect all of humanity. But the idea is something I want to embrace and that I think inherently makes sense.

Maybe as much as we (as in the collective mankind) like to pretend we can handle ourselves - that we can deal with our emotions, solve our own problems or count our British money on our own - in our hearts we all still struggle with the feeling that maybe we're just not mature enough, maybe there's another level of adulthood that we've yet to achieve. We're getting there, perhaps, but we may never feel mature enough to meet our own unfounded high standards of grown-up-ness.

I don't know if it's true. Maybe some people would watch this movie, hear this line, and talk about how they've seen so many troubles in their lives that they don't even question their adulthood. Experience could alter my perception, but I can't help but think that when I am at an age that can be firmly considered grown-up, I will still be struggling with the distinction.

There's nothing wrong with that, though. Not in my opinion. Everyone struggles. We all have problems that need to be worked out. We're never fully matured, we're always learning. Some people may be more infantile than others, but is there anyone who's really exempt? Who would want to be, anyway? Saying that you're a full adult essentially means taking responsibility for all of your actions, all of your feelings and all of your choices. To me, that's a scary prospect. If I'm being fully honest with myself, I will always need a shoulder to cry on, a wise elder or companion to give sound advice.

I feel no shame in this. Perhaps that's what makes me more grown-up than anything. I've accepted I can't know everything, can't ever feel fully mature, and I aim to fill those gaps.

We all need ways to fill gaps in our lives, and just because they exist doesn't mean we're not on our way to becoming functioning human beings. Being an adult however, is not an immediate requirement of human nature. We're free to approach that precipice in due time and when we're ready, and even then there's leeway. After all, it's never right to silence the kid at heart.

So maybe I'm not an adult, and maybe I never will be one. I guess I may never feel the confidence that other people feel. I may always want my mommy, my daddy, my grandma, my sister, someone to hold my hand and guide me through when I'm feeling lost. Maybe that makes me immature, but I like to think it just increases my chances of success. There are strength in numbers, and if adulthood means feigning lone strength then I don't want that fate anyway.

The real world

One of the scariest thoughts I've had recently is of how close I am to the future that I've always envisioned for myself. Whereas even a few months ago the idea of being done with college and moving on with my life felt very very far away, now that I really think about it, by this time next year I'll be in the real world, interning somewhere and hoping to land a job by the time March 2014 rolls around.

It's an odd premise, that I have spent such a short amount of time studying to do something and yet soon I'm going to be thrust into the world with only the knowledge I have and expected to fend for myself not just in business, but in life. Am I ready? I'm not ready. Maybe I am. I'm undecided.

This evening I was watching The Bachelor with my friend Dana. Whenever they interview the various "contestants" (is that what you'd call someone competing on The Bachelor?), their name flashes under them along with their age and occupation or distinction. I tend to watch the show without noticing these little name cards, but today I paid attention to a few and I was astonished to find that some of the girls - who I could only have imagined were significantly older than me - were really not very far off from my own age.

One girl in particular stunned me by being only 24. I'm 20. I could have been enrolled in elementary school with this girl, yet when I look at her I think of her as an adult. I still have trouble thinking of myself as an adult, though.

Maybe that's my problem. I've spent so many years being protected by my family, by the house I grew up in, by the ubiquity of school and homework assignments, that I've never had the chance to comprehend what life must be like after the cap and gown have been worn.

Because it always seemed like a distant prospect, I don't think I ever worried about it much. I always told myself I'd end up in a big city. In my early life I decided this would be New York - home of Broadway shows and amazing pizza. A few years later I contemplated San Francisco - I loved Green Day and was sure I'd go to UC Berkeley and spend my life in the cool, liberal Bay Area. Then my thoughts turned to London - where I could bask in the rain and the love of my life, John Keats, lived. Lately, I've craved a return to Los Angeles and Orange County - where I grew up.

As the time of final choices nears, though, I can't really decide which of these places interests me the most. I've had to consider ruling out some ideas due to impracticality, question some because they may not hold all the opportunities I require. But somewhere in my heart, all these cities have their value and all the possibilities they hold keep me dreaming about the most fantastical future.

Soon that future won't be fantastical. It will be fact.

Several years ago, this was how college felt. I looked towards my years at university as something unfathomable. It was always something to look forward to, but I could barely imagine it happening. Often, my fantasies of college included afternoons walking around an empty campus, while leaves fell around me and I contemplated my life as, what I (in high school) perceived as, an "adult." Once I got to college, I realized that my expectations of it weren't exactly met. Not that my time here hasn't been satisfactory, but you literally can never quite anticipate what will happen once you leave one stage of your life and enter another.

I guess I'm recognizing that now, so long after that visit to New York when I was 11 when I decided I'd live there. Or that visit to San Francisco at 13 when I decided that was the place for me. Or when I went to London at 14 at finally made what I believed to be firm decision that I would live forever in London. Everything seems up in the air now, and I can't quite see myself making any sort of decision until I've actually had a chance to see where life takes me.

That's something I left up to the Gods when I applied to college. Once my applications were in, the city I ended up in depended on where I was accepted. It wasn't really in my hands.

This time around, the choice still isn't fully in my hands. Job applications will be available in different states and I will devote myself to the best prospect. Like before, I may not be sure what it is I'm doing with my life until the very last minute.

It's exhilarating, of course. But it's also terrifying.

Unlike with college, I'm now nearing the beginning of a part of my life that has no foreseeable end. Though I always have the power to change my destiny, it's in no way like the four years of university that inevitably come to an end once your education is (supposedly) complete.

So now I'm reaching a new stage, wherein I'm scared of the finality. I'm worried about where my prospects lie. I don't want to end up finding myself where I don't want to be and getting stuck there out of complacency.

Despite all these worries, though, I have a really weird feeling that everything is going to be all right. Everything will work itself out. Eventually I'll have lived in enough places, experienced enough things and met enough people that I'll feel fulfilled in life, I'm sure of it. And whether the numbers quantifying my experiences are relatively small or incredibly large, I'll be glad to have opened myself up to the possibility of finding myself in a world (with a job and in a city) that I enjoy.

At some point, every new experience is scary. I guess I just hope if I embrace it anyway, things will be fine. So..things will be fine.

Redecorating my life

The other day I was feeling really down without any idea of how to pick myself up out of the slump. I had already watched two films on Netflix. I'd been neglecting my homework for hours because I knew I wouldn't do an adequate job under the circumstances. I'd spent perhaps too much time on Facebook. It was time to think of something new to do.

And as I sat in my room with its ugly, plain dorm furniture and its ugly, plain white dorm walls, I remembered that I'd been neglecting to decorate.

I said I would do it the day I moved in. But after carrying boxes up four flights of stairs (the elevator was busted), organizing my books in descending height order (I think I have OCD) and realizing I own way too much clothing, I decided that putting up all my beautiful wall decorations could and should be left to another day.

But that left my room feeling constantly unfriendly, foreign and even cold. I would walk in and be confronted by the bareness of its appearance. Four walls, one with exposed brick but the others plain white with nothing on them.

I guess I just couldn't bear it any longer.

So to fix my mood both in the short term and the long term, I put up all the decorations that I've collected in my dorm room(s) since freshman year of college. This consists of several murals, including postcards from every Harry Potter film (including one my dad made for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, since I bought the postcards before that film came out); signs for one of my old dorm's yearly traditions with various thematic (nerd) phrases on them like "It's gonna be totally awesome," "I want to go to there" and "Let's Kill Hitler"; a collection of postcards featuring quotes from John Keats and a painting of John Keats that sit near my head when I sleep; a bunch of Disneyland paraphernalia; a set of art postcards I've found at museums from Chicago to London; and a bunch of random posters I've found or received since my first year at college.

Now, you probably didn't care much about all the stuff that decorates my room. And believe me, I had that in mind. That's why I ran through it so quickly, because in fact, the stuff on my walls is not really the point of my writing this.

When I decided to put up all the silly pieces of paper I've accumulated over the years on my walls a few days ago, I did so as a sort of metaphor for what I wanted to do with my life.

I've realized recently that my life isn't exactly what it ought to be. I have great friends, a wonderful family, I think I have fine prospects in the future. What I don't have, though, is the confidence I need in myself.

When I noticed that day that my room had remained undecorated for these first few weeks back at college this winter, it struck me as slightly depressing. All of these postcards, posters and ephemera have been sitting around in boxes waiting to be taken out. They wanted to prove their worth, but I've been forgetting them, leaving them sitting around and proving nothing other than how much dust a few bags of paper can accumulate.

I think I stopped worrying about it because I didn't feel like I had anyone to impress with it. If no one would see my room in the near future, then why should I feel obligated to make it pretty?

In the same vein, if I had no one to impress with my beauty (inside and out), then why should I go through the effort of showcasing it?

For a while I stopped doing my hair, I wouldn't care as much about how I did my make-up, I stopped writing my blog and in the process I sometimes even forgot to work through emotional instabilities I was having.

But all of these things are integral to my personality - even the superficial aspects (like doing my hair and checking my make-up) make me feel a sense of pride in who I am. That isn't to say that without doing my hair or my make-up I feel lousy, but there's something about the conscientiousness that brings out a feeling of accomplishment.

Kind of like redecorating my room can give me added joy when I walk in each evening or wake up each morning.

I've realized lately that it's little things like this that color your life even when you are feeling down in the dumps. The first time a boy broke up with me, I promised myself that I would not let it show. I continued to wake up every morning and go through my beauty routine as if nothing had happened. I reasoned that I would be failing myself to start wearing sweats or not curling my hair each day. The little commitment to taking care of myself filled me with just enough confidence to wake up each day and have the strength to walk out the door.

Waking up to John Keats (or Harry Potter, Disneyland, a quote from 30 Rock/A Very Potter Musical/Doctor Who, an art postcard or a poster for my favorite play) gives me a similar feeling as soon as I open my eyes in the morning. It's strange to think that something so simple can have such a strong effect on your emotions, but it's also so clear cut and so easy to accomplish that I'm sorry I didn't notice it before.

So maybe it sounds weird, and maybe it doesn't quite make sense, but as of now I'm redecorating my life. I'm going to fill it with all the things I love, all that makes me happy and joyous and try to live with a constant awareness of all that is good. There is goodness all around, after all, even if it's just in the form of a few postcards taped to the walls.

Shower me in catharsis

There is nothing like a warm shower to do away with an entire day, few days, maybe even a week of grime and grossness.

This has been one of the strangest weeks of my life. While I feel that I'm still at a stage where personal is personal and I don't want to start divulging stories with the internet when I still haven't come to terms with them yet, what I'll say is this: I've been in love and I've lost my love. And I never realized in what a quick succession those two conditions can occur.

But the point of this blog is not to discuss the feeling of losing what you believe is true love. Maybe in a while I'll feel comfortable exploring that in a public forum. Until then, I'm going to talk about something directly related but also completely separate.

In my youth I loved taking baths. My mom bought me all sorts of toys to play with in the tub. They were organized along a wire rack on the side of the shower opposite the faucet. My favorite was a Hello Kitty-shaped sponge.

But even Hello Kitty couldn't draw my attention away from the beauty that was a shower. Because however often I took baths, and however much I enjoyed them, I loved showers even more. The feeling of warm water streaming down while I arranged my hair atop my head, scrubbing as hard as I could to make my L'Oreal Kids shampoo + conditioner lather and bubble was beautiful, serene, comforting.

So many times I begged my mom to let me take a shower instead of a bath. But because I was so young and didn't understand how to bathe myself properly, she'd often say I had to wait until I was mature enough.

You'd think that in time the appeal would have waned. It never did.

In high school I faced one of my biggest decisions as I took a shower one evening. I was standing there, crying to myself about how stressed I was in my first quarter as a ninth grader. And as the water washed away my tears, it also brought to the surface a decision to quit Speech and Debate, which was probably the best decision I made against my better judgment in all of my teenaged life.

Some of my most stressful moments have been drowned in the waters of a shower.

When I was sick earlier this week, I used it as my sole refuge from the toils of stuffed nose and sore throat. I'd climb in and spend at least 20 minutes letting the steam clear my sinuses and heal me physically and emotionally. Being run down all day can take its toll on your nerves, but at the end of each day there's a warm shower to prove there's something nice to look forward at night no matter how sucky the day is.

Fast forward a few days and I need to vent about something other than sickness. But I can't be too candid on my blog. And I don't want to tire out the subject too much with my closest friends who have been gracious enough to grant me phone calls, afternoons sitting around and talking, instant messages of kindness and uplift, etc. A shower is the one place where I can find a pure catharsis.

And the one place where I can drown out all the sounds and all the feelings other than the purely visceral. The hum of the water and the steady stream wipe away the tears of a difficult day.

So in addition to being thankful for my friendships, my family and my own attempts at self-motivated resilience, I'm glad to have a shower - a place where no one is around to disrupt my privacy and even if they were, I wouldn't hear them over the sound of water hitting the bathtub floor.

We all need a place like this in our lives - where we are cut off from reality, even if only for a few minutes a day. I don't think I quite realized until today how very much I need it. But now that I have, I'll never underestimate the power of the daily routine.

Return to a fix

In the past several days I've managed to almost forget about my blog. In the process, however, I think I forgot myself as well - and the kind of person I am.

I've lost a lot in the past couple days. A sense of security, the feeling of being loved, some of my hope for the future. I fought to keep these things, but in the end sometimes you must give things away in order to grow.

The reason I started this blog over a year ago - and the reason I used it to record a stream of consciousness every day for 366 straight evenings - was that I needed to let out my emotions. I used it as an outlet for things I had pent up, for concerns I had. It got me through a few losses just like this one, in fact it was born out of one. And it helped.

I love my blog. Even though it has turned around and bitten me in the bum a couple of times, when I think on all that I've done for myself in practicing my writing for an entire year and just for my own pleasure, I feel proud. If I haven't accomplished anything this whole year, at least I can say I've done something consistent, something good for my soul.

In a way I think I've started neglecting my blog at the same time that I started neglecting myself and the ones I loved. Once we assume we're happy - in a relationship, in friendships, with family, etc. - we stop thinking it's necessary to write down our emotions.

But humans are fickle creatures. We are always filled to the brim with concerns. Our lives are never as simple as we'd like them to be. Even when we're babies our brains are working a mile a minute to calculate and memorize as much information as possible. Once we're older that energy is transposed into an effort to consolidate information and make sense of it. Everything has to be reorganized until it makes sense. If it doesn't make sense, we flip out.

Or at least, that's my way.

It's something I've grappled with for years - the feeling that I needed to fix things constantly, to check that everything is okay at any point in time. I have to make sense of everything and I don't just let go and live carefree, even if I like to believe I possess some degree of openness, of optimism.

Everyone has pent-up angst/aggression/what-have-you. We are all dealing with our own troubles, our own emotions, the feelings that bother us even when we know it's irrational. And we all have our own outlets.

Some people are self-destructive, others lay their unhappiness on others, some resort to more serious choices (physical harm or otherwise) to deal with their stress. I've always been some combination of the first two.

My blog helped me out of that state. Instead of unloading my fears onto my own heart or the hearts of others, I put it on the conscience of this imaginary person - The Songs of Spring. She - apparently my blog is female, hopefully this isn't incongruous with some gender I've given him/her in the past - isn't a "person" I have to worry about. I never need worry I'm being too hard on her. I can be open, I can share too much sometimes. I can reach catharsis without any visible detriment to the world.

I wish I'd never abandoned her. Because as fulfilling as it may seem to have someone nearby who will help you through your problems, sometimes the best medicine is the kind you alone can prescribe - the words you can set down on paper (or in a blog) and then let work themselves out.

If I had known the unnecessary toll I could take on someone else by making them worry about my own shtick, I'd never have unloaded anything in the first place.

So I'm returning to my blog. Maybe not every day for 365 days into 2014, but certainly throughout the process of healing myself. I grew dependent on having this blog in 2012 and while that worried me about a month ago - and made me justify why it made sense to stop writing - I realize that decision was rash. It was my blog, in fact, that was keeping me sane.

We all have our vices. Mine happens to be that I share my feelings a bit too freely. It's not out of spite, nor vindictiveness. I never have the design of hurting anyone. I want you to know that.

I figured out this evening that the best place to express my feelings might just be on a blog site that only a few people will ever read.

I never mean to burden anyone with my problems. I never mean to hurt or pain anyone with them. I just mean to share - maybe to help myself (when possible), and hopefully along the way I can bring clarity to others who face the same problems I do.

This blog is a place where you have the choice to read about my problems, or my thoughts (they needn't be negative all the time - I'm not a negative person at heart). You don't have to, though. If you do, I hope it won't make you resent me, but serve as proof that you're not alone. We're not alone. Everyone deals with sadness, loss, pain, anger, distress and utter defeat. If we can find a way to share those feelings without bringing down others or ourselves, then that is truly the best thing we can do.

That's what I want to do here, now.