And it draws to a close...

For me it's almost like the closer the end of summer gets, the longer the days stretch. Time is a funny thing.

From about first to sixth grade, a year was an eternity. After 365 days, you would be so radically different from your former self that you could hardly understand how you were capable of making decisions on your own. After all, 10 is infinitely superior to 9--you've finally reached the decade line.

Then life started speeding up and little things started not to matter as much. You broke up with your boyfriend, so what, it would probably blow over in thirty days (except for those few who felt as if they had to succumb to the stereotypical "ex" role--a surprising few). In middle school there was always hope for the future. You had six years left, five years left, for all you know everything in your life could change. And for most of us it did. I can remember being terrified I'd lose my friends once I got to high school, because I had heard so many myths about it. I wish I could have told myself that friendships happen organically. People I didn't know in middle school have grown into my closest friends, and the people that you truly want to hang on to don't just disappear without adequate reason. If they change, chances are you're likely to change too. If I was still at the same level of mental functioning that I was in middle school, I would have a very different set of friends that I would probably be just as happy with.

Freshman year came and went. I was incredulous that people could profess to "hate" freshmen--there was nothing wrong with me. I was outraged. It was ageism. And then June rolled around and the disgust clouded the new Sophomores' faces: "Oh, no. I couldn't stand the sevvies. I can't believe we have to deal with them again," while still looking forward to seeing the friends you had made in 8th grade PE, where you actually had to wait behind the yellow line.

Sophomore year was the turning point in my life, I think. That was when I officially begin to classify myself as an adult. At that age, I believed myself informed enough to vote, logical enough to buy a lottery ticket, conscious enough to be trusted buying something off HSN or skydiving. And certainly capable enough to make a decision about getting a piercing or tattoo. Sophomore year was the point where you could split off your adulthood from your former self. It was okay to mention how dumb you had been at the seventh grade dance where you forgoed dancing to eat candy off the table, when you hid in the library from someone asking your friend to promotion, where you had garnered 10 behavior slips and failed every life science quiz you took (yes, that was me).

Every day that goes by you feel more and more mature, more capable to make decisions than you were yesterday. I wonder if this holds true for the rest of my life. I wonder if I will be 42 someday, looking back at this post and thinking how naive I was, how much smarter and how much worldlier I am then. I probably will.

But for now I feel as if I am trying my hardest to understand what I haven't understood so far, and that's all you can ask of anyone, really.