:: a.whisper.in.water ::

:: Sunday, January 04, 2004 ::

[ another year over / and a new one just begun ]

Goodness. It would appear (and it takes a while to sink in, for the self-identity to catch up to the digit rollover) that as of this morning, I’m twenty. Years. Old. Aren’t I far, far too young to actually feel old and unprepared for Things To Come? Being a junior in college was weird enough. Now I’ve got three semesters left, and the new tens-digit in my age is a pretty solid reminder of the looming presence of The Real World. Mubi, at his 28th-birthday party on New Year’s Eve, quipped that I should stay in school “for as long as possible,” which isn’t looking to be too bad an idea. The question of my future is getting harder and harder to ignore, and damned if school doesn’t present a little bubble, another few years living in a self-reinforcing ivory tower. However, it’s not as though I won’t have to get a pretty substantial job if and when I go to Yet More School. I guess there’s always the Ben-route into the future, though giving up the sciences would be hard, being successful would be even farther from assured, and the rat race would pretty effectively claim my soul.

The Real World is far from as simple as I’ve made it so I could wander around like a smart-ass and avoid giving anything too much thought unless conversationally prompted. Dad tends to treat instances of analysis as new, even though a few fundamental principles (e.g., your traditional “big” religions evolve into social establishments, rather than remaining spiritual ones) tend to be able to explain most situations. However, despite the efficiency of fundamental principles, I imagine that at the very least within the realm of social thought, my large-scale pattern recognition is causing me to ignore everything out of discouragement by the moot-ness of it all. Though I may have more “figured out” than your bargain-basement fuckitall stoner, sitting around being clever makes me just as worthless as sitting around being baked. A resolution, be it on the occasion of getting older, or simply because it’s a worthwhile thing to do: start giving a damn again, in smallish quantities at first such that I don’t overload on sheer rage at how miserably imperfect the world is, ‘cause that’s way teenage:

And there’s the issue of birthdays in general. I tend to quip about how I always get $100 and a trip to some token chain restaurant, and how I’d much rather prefer gifts. Money doesn’t fit in with the Ideal Gift Ethos (i.e., I have had no idea I needed this Thing, and have had no idea anyone would ever get me this Thing, and had no real idea this Thing existed, but SHIT am I glad to have it for free!), and is spiritless. I’ve always felt birthdays are really goddamn special, and have always wanted mine to be. I always want to feel like a million bucks on my birthday and be treated as such. A birthday should never ever be a dull, normal day. So, I try to remember friends’ birthdays, and respect them as oddly holy in this childlike way. So, I’m most grateful to anyone who wishes me happy birthday (my mom was really cute about it and hovered around me until the stroke of midnight, at which point she hugged me. It was Warm. Things with her have been exceptionally good this break, and I wonder why, since I’ve been on a sickeningly bad schedule…), and hope someone shares this feeling of special-ness that I don’t ever intend to let slip into the land of Principles Discarded. It’s just supposed to be YOUR DAY, goddamnitt. I guess that makes it my day.

Holy fuck, I’m twenty years old, sitting on my bed, listening to glitch (voted the worst music ever to play in The Gap) and feeling all kinds of reflective. Pretty par for the course, I imagine. I wonder if I’ll ever become someone worth becoming rather than someone who’s just existed for a while. I have inspirational figures all around me. The tough bit is, I can’t excuse myself. I know I’ve got what I need to Grow Up.

But does it have to happen now?

:: Aziz 4:10 AM [+] ::
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