This blog is brought to you by the word “Nintendo.”
I’m just going to skip the fact that I haven’t written in a hot minute and jump right into this post.
I asked Facebook friends to write one word in my comments to inspire a post, and today’s word is “Nintendo.”
I’ve been a grown-A** (pardon my language) adult for OVER 20 years now, which brings on panic mode every time I say it. I feel like I’m 15 years younger. A spring chicken with mistakes to make and the big ol’ world ahead.
Instead, I will turn 40 at some point this year, which is kind of hard to say. It’s just a number that represents 40 years of lessons learned, (LOTS) of chapters written in the Book of Meg, and empty pages to fill ahead. But still, it snuck up on me. Rude.
That said, I was flipping through the chapters of my life and thinking about times when I thought, “This is it! I’m a grown up doing grown up things!”
Lets take a look at these moments.
The 20s: The Toddler of Adulthood
The 20s were a weird time spent comparing myself to others my age and feeling like they all had a manual for how life should look and I lost mine somewhere.
I spent far too much time finding old acquaintances on social media and wondering why I didn’t have my fancy apartment in Downtown Big City that was paid for by the corporate job I didn’t have.
This was a full-on quarter-life crisis, but no one told me that that’s even a thing. I didn’t have the How to Be in Your 20s Manual, remember.
That said, there were a few times when I felt like a bona fide grown up.
For instance, I got married at the beginning of these days. Planned a cool ceremony and celebration that still brings smiles to people’s faces. That’s pretty grown up.
*Spoiler, we amicably divorced ten years later. Also grown up.
And I up and raised a real-life dog. That little fella went through his toddler years of chewing up remotes, his clingy kiddo years of wanting to be held at all times (loved it), his teen years of pretending he was too cool for us, and finally his adult years of taking care of me when times were tough. Feels pretty grown up that I up and raised a whole dog.
Honorable Mentions
Moved to a different city and learned the bus route to get to work. Public transportation in my hometown isn’t top-of-mind if you have a car, so other than grabbing a city bus to high school for a 1-mile ride, I never needed to become well-versed in the ways of bus-life.
Attempted, though failed, at scolding loud teenagers at a library where I worked. They looked me up and down, laughed, and said, “Anywaaay,” to return talking to their friends, but scolding them still felt scary and very grown up.
Planned a move to California and somehow found a safe(ish) place to live, grabbed an incredible job, and started grad school.
The 30s: The Teen Years of Adulthood
My 30s were a time when I realized there isn’t a handbook on adulting. All we know is that we don’t know everything.
And comparing your life to anyone else’s is like comparing a tree to a reptile. They’re both organisms, and the similarities stop there.
If we take a glance back at my 20s, we’ll see that I felt grown up when I gathered up some courage, approached teenaged girls (who were taller than me, by the way) and scolded them. The attempt was futile, but I tried. ::pats my head::
In my 30s, I returned to work at a library and a group of tweens were being super loud and disrespectful. I mustered up all of the courage I had, repeated to myself, “You’re a grown up. This is what you do. You’re a grown up…” approached the kids and stated something along the lines of, “THIS IS LIBRARY. NO SCREAM IN LIBRARY. PLAY AT PARK OUTSIDE.”
The absolute shock that came over me when they actually listened and quietly scurried out the doors was quickly morphed into a hunger for power, and I asked my coworkers if they needed me to scold anyone else who was 5 feet or under. They didn’t, but now I at least got a glimpse into what it will feel like to tell kids to stay off my lawn in another 40 or so years.
And before I list the biggest moment when I felt like a full-on adult, I’ll toss out my honorable mentions from my 30s.
Honorable Mentions
Attending conferences for work… And giving presentations.
This one is a big deal and maybe doesn’t belong as an honorable mention.
When I take a good, hard look at myself, I see a woman-child who can’t get through a meeting without sitting “criss-cross applesauce” like a kindergartner during reading time. A kid in a woman’s body who still takes her stuffed bunny on vacations — including to these conferences. A person whose feelings hurt when people call a dandelion a weed.
And that same person has stood in front of a trusting crowd of people to tell them how to improve their work in the field of higher education?
Okay, this actually deserves a blog post of its own, but discovering a bat – the living kind – in my house and safely getting it out with only the help of Google and emotional support of my friends through SnapChat. Remind me to tell you the whole story some time.
And now, the most recent feeling of being a gall-dern adult.
Purchasing a Nintendo Switch.
Have I bought house appliances? Yes. Have a purchased a new roof? Indeed. Do I have car payments, phone bills, property taxes? Yup, yup, yup.
Shouldn’t those make me feel like the adult that I am?
Maybe.
But buying a Nintendo Switch even though I’m Without Children and Without Spouse made me feel very much like a fully grown woman.
It’s something I got to buy with my grown up money for my grown up self. It was my moment of, “Hold up! I want this. I want it for me. I can have it!”
My usual thought process when spending money is as follows:
Do you need this to survive?
Do you need this for legal purposes (e.g., I must wear clothes in public)?
Do you need this to help others?
Do you simply want this because it will make you happy?
And with this question, sirens go off and a loud speaker in my head announces, “SHE WANTS THIS ITEM! SHUT DOWN ACCESS TO MONEY! SHE WANTS SOMETHING SHE DOESN’T NEED! ACTIVATE GUILT EMOTION! WEE OH WEE OH!”
That last part it how my brain makes a siren sound.
So to look at my grown up money and purchase something simply because it made me feel happy… That is the most recent moment when I felt like, “Dang, girl. Look atchoo, being a grown up and stuff.”
Midnight Musings with Megs 