People shopping for flooring at Bed, Bath, and Beyond, having "couple's" dinners, getting up at the same time each morning, sleeping at the same time each night, staying in the same career for 25 years, dying in their bed at 95. I'm sorry, but am I the only person absolutely terrified by this existence????? I've been having this little post-25 traumatic stress issue with normalcy in life and how the people around me all seem to embrace it excitedly for the last few years and I need to just get this out there and pray I'm not alone.
Ok.....is this all there is? I'm sure we all ask this constantly, but when I see all my childhood friends (save a few) buying houses and having babies to put in these houses and giving up eyeliner for bouncy chairs and having a big date night consist of the same restaurant they went to last Saturday, it's honestly freaking me out. Are they happy? I'm not trying to judge, if it makes them happy, then fantastic! Live on you happy go-getters living out your dream! But....I mean, how CAN they be happy? I know I obviously suffer from a serious thrill-seeking disorder, but even people less inclined to chase down feeling than I am must not be able to look around their living room every night and feel like THIS is the life they intended. Isn't there some little voice in them saying, "Remember that girl who wanted to do a Europe road trip and have a lover in every language?" Or "I wonder if I would have practiced a little harder on that guitar, if John Mayer would be opening for me...." Those voices happen right? I'm not the only schizophrenic in the room, riiiiiiiiight?
Here's the thing: I really love doing new things. I really hate doing the same thing. A lot of my life's misery can be summed up in those two statements, but it doesn't make them any less true. I understand the kind of people that move every 3 years, or have really freakishly dangerous jobs, or just cannot seem to sustain relationships. Actually, I think I just described all of my closest friends! But is our little gang of misfits the only group out there living this way? Are we the ones that are missing out? Is there truly some unimagined joy in that alarm clock starting your day like Groundhog's Day each morning that I am missing out on? I don't see it, but I've been wrong before!
Is this something we'll grow out of? My soulmate cousin and I have this conversation daily, in different states, in different lives, but continually asking the same question: Why didn't we WANT that? And more importantly...why do they want it so bad? I overheard a girl talking about the need to be married by the time she's 30 or she was going to "order a mail order husband immediately." She was so serious. This poor woman, who couldn't be more than 25 was completely distraught at the thought that she might be unmarried at 30. I wanted to grab her and shake her and slap her, mostly because I want to think people like this don't exist, because then it doesn't make ME the freak at baby showers wanting to bring an "I'm Sorry For Your Loss....of Freedom" card.
It isn't even the having of kids and marriage and all those lovely notions that are the core of what I recoil from in actuality. It's the normalcy. It's the fear that routine and monotony and blandness and predictability will become the forefront of my life. I just drove to a city full of lights and gambling last weekend and every single amazing event that happened there was unplanned. I took a job 4 months ago that opened a door to an entirely new lifestyle and set of people, night creature livers that I had never known before. Is there supposed to be an end to these new adventures? And if there is...why would people seek that out? If I stop searching for the new, what do I become? Does stagnant living stop the evolution of my being? Or is that the evolved state? Sometimes I wonder if my REAL fear is that I will love that life, and become one of them. I'll wake up one day in my minivan, halfway to Wednesday's soccer practice, and suddenly realize I'm one of them and loving it, and this person I've been so far is all gone. What a terrifying idea!!! Does age mean we must conform to this role of woman? This woman who puts herself last, her dreams on hold for possibly ever, her highlights grown out for months, her eyeliner in the bottom drawer, her daily activities focused on a calendar of events that have nothing to do with her? Is this mandatory? Because....I don't wanna.
