A Quarter Century Assessment

Do you remember being eighteen and having plans? Like, serious oh-my-god-i'll-die-if-this-doesn't-happen plans? And you had deadlines to meet these plans, which were really more goals than anything. For example, my friend Paul wanted to own a home by the time he was twenty-two. Another friend of mine wanted to have a child by the time he was twenty-five. Another friend of mine planned to live so hard and fast and wild that he would be dead before he was thirty. My friend Nikki wanted to be a yoga instructor before she was twenty-five, and my friend Shana wanted to have at least two pair of Jimmy Choos by the time she was twenty-three.
Well, thus so far, Paul is the only one who's dream made it out of the gate, much less finished the race. The rest of us.....we're still standing around in the stable.

While talking to my mother today, I realized that I'm staring twenty-five years of age in the face. I'm not freaked that thirty is not far behind. Getting older has only bothered me once, and that was when I was nineteen and I realized in four months I'd be twenty- and what bothered me then was that I was no longer going to be a stupid kid but a stupid adult. I cried and got over it.
But now....as I stare down this 25 in the face like I'm John Wayne and it's a man in a black cowboy hat, I realize I've fallen short. My plan was to have made it to California and back and everywhere in between by myself- just me, a bag full of clothes, and a guitar and to have graduated from college. I've done neither. I mean, I crossed the continent in a way- I went from Michigan to Alabama- but it wasn't East to West. And as of August, I'll have graduated with a double associates- not a double bachelor's, like intended. I've gone half-way. Half-way has never before been in my vocabulary.

My dad said to me last night that I expect too much of myself- and I heartily disagree. I only expect my best from me, and I know that I'm capable of something great...I just don't know what. It's definitely not a great deal of patience or focus. I get too distracted by the 'shiny' things. I get distracted by loneliness and the next big adventure or a really amazing idea for a band or something. If I'd spent half the energy doing something worthwhile that I'd spent on bullshit, I could've made it to California and back and I could've made it through college already.

Instead, I'm in high school part two and I use electrical tape to get the lint off my boyfriend's work shirts because we're too poor to buy a lint roller or a roll of masking tape.

I'm grateful for my life- I've had a great time and it's been truly epic. I've lived some shit that they make movies out of. But....I've still fallen short of my goals, and I don't know what to do about it. I've run out of time. It's not gonna happen. I can never be a twenty-two year old girl playing an acoustic guitar for money in the middle of Denver, Colorado.
But what is there to do? It's live or die- and I may as well live, even if it is with an undone checklist.