so...is this it?
The only updates come from Facebook. Her bump gets bigger with every post, adding slideshows from the accompanying events: announcement, baby shower, maternity shoot, progression selfies in between. The strangest part is how young she always seemed, even now, the cusp of childbirth. Not chronologically, I’m only two months older, we’re practically twins. No, it’s her commitment to naivety. We grew up heavily sheltered. She got homeschooled and while I floundered under house arrest. She knew even less than I did about how the world worked, though she accepted Catholicism wholeheartedly, unthinkingly, without a care in the world. Blasphemy chafed me, put circles under my eyes, all necessary right? Growing pains grew out keeping sweet and obeying always, the mantra like a cement mixer poured over my head. How silly to position myself as a more sophisticated version of her to you, to treat her with a kindly patronization when she is now a Wife and Soon-To-Be-Mother, a Master’s degree under her belt and mortgage payments on her nuclear family home to boot. I spend my free time scouring Love Island reddit threads for morsels of digital eroticism, too secluded to pursue it in real life. Clearly I’m the Master of Life here.
I turn twenty-seven today. I don’t feel anything major about it, and I suppose that’s the problem. Shouldn’t I? Feel it? It’s late twenties, baby. Not a youngin’ anymore! Yet what do I have to show for my maturity? It’s not just the fact that I haven’t hit any of the conventional hallmarks. I don’t want to hit them right now, promise, and I may never hit them for the rest of my life. Marriage sounds rough, and birthing a child is a laughably unserious decision for me to make. Maybe home ownership will make me feel real, serious, present and accounted for, that’s always an option if I penny-pinch enough into a six-figure payment. Alas, it is arrested development in my rental apartment, co-signed by a roommate, slogging through a 9-5 til kingdom come. The Evangelicals are nuts, but I have to give it to them, if Jesus does come back and level the Earth to rubble from our sinful conduct, at least it would make a Day in the Life of ME more interesting.
Today is like all others of birthdays past: sunny, hot, close to the water. I walked, sweated, ate a bagel, planned to buy a chocolate fudge cake later, all a repeat of last year’s festivities. There is no biological clock ticking down down down to Doomsday, no empty hole in my heart where the love of my life awaits. But I do want more. I want it so bad it hurts. Manna dropped from heaven, a sign from the universe that I have crossed the threshold from perpetual girlhood into Personhood. As debilitating as those hallmarks can be on the psyche, they’re at least demonstrable signs that you’re not a kid anymore, that you don’t behave like one, that you’ve made the official choice to grow the fuck up. No endless Groundhog Day loop. A line graph that only goes up, plotted and charted.
It stems from the Traverse City airport incident. Coming back from a work trip, I lined up to pass through TSA pre-check, one of the few perks my nonprofit can give. The ticketing agent handed me a yellow laminated sign with “PRE-CHECK” in bold black letters. Is this really necessary? I’m already in the right line. Double and triple-checked to make sure. So what the hell is this? Who do I give it to? This is the security-clearance for the billion-dollar Transportation Security Administration? As I peered down towards the metal detector, absolutely bewildered, another agent caught my eye, middle-aged, mustache, attempting to be fatherly. “Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii,” he drawled, addressing me like an elementary school student lost on a field trip. Uh, hey? Do I give this to you? What in god’s name is happening in Michigan? He took the slip from me, and I passed through the procedure like normal. “Sorry, you looked like you’d have a little voice like that,” he said as I went by. Should’ve screamed, made a scene, transformed into a Karen like my foremothers. I’M OLD I’M OLD STOP TREATING ME LIKE THISSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS but I laughed, laughed it off, pushed it away like I always do, because dutifulness is the lot drawn for the girl-woman.
Genuinely think I will snap if one more person assumes I’m a teenager and demands I be happy that I look like one. So how do we prevent this? Metamorphosize out the cocoon during this age of peril and instability? It’s unfortunate to announce that human beings have been, still are, and will always be materialistic creatures. By this I mean I must channel Cher Horowitz and give myself a makeover. Because if I can’t love the way I look, how am I ever gonna convince TSA that I don’t need a parental guardian to sign off on an extended body search?
Clothes are the logical place to start. I have too many sweaters from high school, janky Forever 21 crop tops from freshman dorm parties, and sandals ground down to the bone from ten years of excursions. Climate activists would applaud me for thrift, but I confess, the state of the planet isn’t top of mind, it’s stasis and a cheapskate attitude. My wardrobe changes at a glacial pace. I just got those tight-fighting, boob-enhancing tops that turn me into a Pilates Princess at my $50 a month gym, finally sweating in style next to men in plain t-shirts. No judgement here (well, no total judgement.) My casual wear options slowly build with baby tees, a rotation of muted colors, hitting the perfect torso-to-hip ratio so it’s cropped but not stomach-barring. Wear them to the office, wear them to dinner, wear them to the club. Utilitarian Chic. Real workwear eludes me. Nowhere do I feel more insignificant in stature than the runways of Boston’s Harborwalk, the final leg of my commute from South Station. Sidewalks plagued by financiers, consultants, Young Working Professionals. The women look incredible. Kitten heels, linen pants, leopard-print maxi skirts, blousy tanks, espadrilles, satin dresses, thigh-high boots, fresh mani-pedis, SLICK 👏BACKED 👏BUNS👏. Insecurities manifested to perfection. I slog through the rush hour crowds, my black high school backpack cutting into my shoulders, drenching my back in sweat, keeping me secure in its nostalgic talons. See? A robust closet helps, will set me on the right track. Fake it til you make it in those Aritzia pants, you know?
The woman of my dreams is everywhere except the mirror. Envy is an arousal, the knowledge that pleasure will await when I am comfortable in my own skin. Confidence powering my feet, arching my back, straightening my spine, tits up, gaze forward, I am I am I am. Out with the youth, in with the old. Yes, yes, still philosophically bereft, still emotionally bankrupt. Connoisseurship is but one mode of elevation. There are countless other changes that get me away from this rut. Hit the gym, quit the apps, do Powerpoint nights with friends, read, think, here here here! The void closes through sheer will! It has to! Or else it swallows you whole! And that won’t do! As long as you exert towards the state of the mechanical, desensitize long enough, keep away from this existential monotony that plagues all of us, even in relationships or with children or in big shiny homes, plagues us in the hour before sleep comes, Blessed Refuge, when the ceiling fan stares back and the third-floor heat beads sweat on your face and nighttime fantasies dance across eyelids, building set pieces and stories and parallel universes of better lives.