Or so I thought. They were taken at Lake Erie, near Oberlin, on the day of my 20th birthday - four years ago. Four years is a long time. It's half a college career plus two whole years in the "real" world. It's seven addresses. It's about ten jobs. It's a handful of relationships. A good dose of heartbreak. Enough collective alcohol to wash down a small town. Recurring stages of wrenching confusion about life and a few lovely streaks of clarity.
Tonight I'm having dinner with nine friends, four of whom have been in my life since those pictures were taken. Georgia and Rachel have both been steady constants since a freshman year acting class at Oberlin. One friend, Samantha, has held the friend title since we unpacked our underwear together at Camp Ballibay 11 years ago. My sister Amanda takes the proverbial cake, though, as she came into my life when I was going on the Big-Girl age of three.
...I've been trying to blast away the sensation of aging by hurling balls of various weights and sizes at vulnerable stationary objects.
(I'm either bowling, or ballroom dancing solo with a very tall partner.)
(Can't you just hear the contact? I'm going for number One there.)
Yes, I cut my hair - it was a birthday present to myself. In fact, those last two shots were taken only hours apart. I love it, but I'm going to miss rocking the long hair thing. There's something sexy and feminine about just having long hair.
(Shut up, it's my party and I can post pictures of myself if I want to.)
But I like the new 'do, I think. I feel older, which I guess is appropriate. One of those superficial changes that feels much larger.
When it really comes down to it, though... in spite of all the growing and developing and yadda yadda over the years... I still feel pretty much just like this.
Which is just the way I like it.
1 comment:
Jessie! Fuck - I'm so bad at this. I'll remember your birthday one of these years. I should've known - it was always right before school started or in the first week or so. I was having similar feelings on my birthday (of course my older friends laughed at me). I was like 'What the fuck have I DONE with my life?' Scarlet Johansen is like 12 and on Dave Letterman. People have gold medals by the time they're my age. Shit, people are RETIRED from sports at my age. But then I thought, wait a sec, my childhood sucked. Highschool was okay, college was kinda fun (what I can remeber of it) but I've had more fun in the last few years than all of that put together (okay, the last two years in college were a fuckin' blast). My point is, at least for me, the shit keeps getting better and I'm more in control now of how it goes than ever. That's pretty cool. Your hair looks awesome, by the way. Happy birthday.
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