A field guide to growing up without growing apart
I’ve never wanted to live alone. To me living alone has always seemed like a bad idea. I don’t want to be lonely or lazy, have high expenses or tons of housework. I don’t want to have to call people to hangout with all the […]
Onward and upward! We’ve loved every minute of our time at wordpress.com but in honor of the new year (2015 already?! SERIOUSLY?!) we’ve upgraded to an official site! www.twentysomethingcondition.com If you’re already following us your subscription should be transferred automatically and if not please turn […]
A few months ago the father of my close friends died.
Our parents raised us together, me and a pair of twins, a boy and a girl (I’ll call them Rachel and Charles) and I’m so grateful for them. We lived on opposite sides of town so we didn’t go to school together until 4th grade when the neighborhood boundaries switched and I walked into my new classroom to see Charles waving me over to come sit next to him. We’ve all been there for each other ever since, cheering each other on at sporting events and graduations, traveling together and sending letters across states, friends that are bound by more than just a few shared experiences. They’re part of my family, the fabric of who I am, and though I haven’t seen them more than a few times each year lately, I’ve never doubted how important we are to each other.
So when in August I heard that their father was in the hospital and they were coming back to Utah to see him, I was glad I’d get to spend time my friends. No one thought he’d be dead a few days later. Charles came back in time, spending his last day with him in the hospital joking and taking about where his father hid his weed. Rachel got to the hospital an hour too late, flying in from Alaska was just too far and no one thought their lively, 57 year old father was really at the end.
I sent them a text when I heard, saying I loved them and that I’d tell our friends, not wanting to be in the way when I knew they were about to be bombarded with family and friends and shock. Calling our other friends was hard, I was the only one in town and they all wanted to know what they could do – I told them there wasn’t even anything I could do. We’ve all been so lucky, none of us have lost anything close to a parent.
The next few days went slowly. I worked a lot and didn’t reach out to my friends, crying alone at lunch thinking about what they must be going through. People ask so much of you when you’re the family, I just couldn’t be another person that they had to deal with. I knew they knew I’d do anything for them, but my gift was letting them know that they didn’t have to do anything for me. He died Sunday morning and I stopped by on Wednesday to drop off a few photos of their father that my family had found, they were glad to see me, and insisted I stay to help them organize the photos for the funeral. I stopped by every day after that to help glue and print and fill the boxes of things that would represent their father at the funeral, making jokes and enjoying my friends liked I’d hoped to a week earlier.
My friends are tough, so strong that I only saw them cry about their father at the funeral when they were speaking together on stage. The rest of the time they smiled and laughed about their dad’s messy office and asked family friends about their lives. I smuggled them food at the funeral and blocked when they needed a break, doing my best to keep the mood light – that is what they needed from me, distraction.
But in the months since I feel like it’s getting harder and harder to keep distracted. The funeral and subsequent weeks felt like they were about other people – extended family, friends, insurance providers – every time I was out with them we ran into another person who wanted to talk to them about it or someone who hadn’t yet heard. I had to stand there as they comforted person after person, nodding and smiling so whoever it was would let them leave. But now it feels so much more personal, not only because I’m doing my best to be there for my friends, but also because I’m starting to admit my loss as well. I’m only feeling a small part of what they are, but I miss their father and without him here things are different.
Their birthday was last week and before Rachel left town for a ski race she told me to take care of her brother, that he’d never ask me himself to make his birthday special. I was planning to already but I took him bowling and out for a drink, trying REALLY hard to ‘act normally’ as I did my best to keep him entertained and distracted. But it felt harder than usual to keep smiling, and I felt a bit like I let him down as I dropped him off at his mother’s house barely after 9pm.
I know the three of them aren’t alone, they all have each other, and so many others, but they have such a large responsibility to each other now. And I know time heals, but lately I’m afraid that it’s going to get worse before it gets better. As the distractions fall away they’re going to be left with the truth. Their father isn’t around. And I don’t know if I can help.
So, it is November already. Oh wait, November is more than half over! How did that happen? Well here we have a (very late) edition of the condition of the month. This month we all thought a bit about that dreaded affair: the high school […]
A while back both Cindy and Snow wrote posts on a few things they’re too old/young for (seriously, passive aggression is never good) and after having an eventful house party last weekend I have a list of my own I’d like to share. Here follows […]
We’ve all been a little (try a lot) distracted this month, so rather than scrap our monthly condition post we’ve just decided to post it now (very, very late) and talk about the things that distract us.
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Man oh man am I busy. That’s a fact. But who is to say which parts of my life are the distractions and which are the real things that I should be focused on? Sure finding a job and applying for health insurance are things I need to do, but isn’t spending time with my mother watching a television show we both love just as important? Since I’m about to move out my parents’ house for good I have to buy a new bed for my new place and stock up on groceries, but I also have photos from my spring trip to Paris and Spain and Ireland that my friends have been not so patiently waiting to see. Which is the distraction? Should I work to submit my photobook vouchers that expire at the end of the month or to finish the half written blog posts that never seem done? Should I spend my time working out or catching up on the news, cleaning the bathroom or trying to get a letter of recommendation? All I really want to do is to organize my room by sewing up another t-shirt quilt and scrapbooking all my high school boxes, but with so many other things with actual deadlines I just never feel ahead. And as if these distractions aren’t enough, throw other people into the mix and you’ve got one super unfocused person. You already know I spent an unreasonable portion of my summer preparing for my friend’s wedding, and you won’t believe how much time I’ve spent helping my brother with school and housing and everything else in his life. I write letters to friends, head out on hikes to catch up and go on trips just because I think they’ll appreciate it. My friend is going through a bad breakup and I’m even part of a secret Facebook group called Support Our Friend where we come up with ways we can help her. I could easily spend my whole life distracted by other people. But as distracting as friendships are, they’re worth it and as never ending as my projects are, they matter to me. Sure, I feel constantly distracted, like I should always be somewhere else doing something else, but I also always feel accomplished, because I’m constantly working to check things off my list. If I go on Facebook it’s to strengthen a friendship, if I am washing the dishes I’m making my family proud, if I make a scrapbook I’m de-cluttering my life. It’s true, all these things distract me from figuring out a career and a future, but all the things I choose to do make me who I am. And it’s exciting to realize that no matter what I do, nothing can distract me from that.
-Sleeping Booty
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Unlike any school I’ve ever attended, my current school had a two-week break at the beginning of October, so I got to go visit Merskank in the U.K. and relax for a while, which was really nice after a whirlwind first month of work. But for the last week it’s been back to school and back to the grindstone. I can tell you that I have a huge to-do list, with most of the items being school related. This is just part of life as a teacher—the work never ends. Luckily, I like doing what I do, so it doesn’t stress me out to have two novel units just getting off the ground and another one (on a book I haven’t actually gotten around to reading) imminently approaching, plus a social studies course, applying for a lead teacher position, an afterschool club, and other assorted responsibilities. Well, it doesn’t stress me out too much. Other than work, there isn’t too much to distract me, honestly. My husband and I are both in a busy season professionally, so we pretty much come home, collapse, cuddle for a few minutes, and then engage in what I like to call garden therapy. We walk around the backyard, look at the veggie plants just starting to sprout up (and our banana tree, which is just starting to bear fruit!) and talk about our days. And then…we have dinner and are in bed by 9 p.m., ready to do it all the next day. It’s busy, but it sure beats being unemployed!
-Cinderslut
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Distractions. Right now I feel like I’m letting life itself be a distraction. Lately I’ve been feeling that its time for me to make some job/career changes, but I hate the thought of applying to jobs and so I let my normal “busy life” be an excuse/distraction to keep me from actually putting effort towards making positive changes in my life. I will always be busy, so it’s not really a good excuse, but if I have to focus on work for 40 hours a week, and my home/social life for the rest of the time, than I can distract myself from the part of me that wants more. I know that it will get harder to keep that part of me silent, but at the same time, my fear of change and risk can be pretty loud as well. It’s definitely not a good long term solution, but it’s just so easy to do. And don’t all of us to some extent let the comfort of our everyday lives distract us from pursuing our goals and dreams? It is easier to consume yourself in the small dramas of everyday life than to ask yourself what you really want. Because if you ask yourself what you really want, one of two things will happen. Either you will realize that you have no idea what you really want (which is frustrating), or you will recognize what you really want but realize that getting there will be huge challenge and you don’t know if you have the guts to go through with it( which is terrifying). So when we come to that point, what do we do? We pretend like we never had the thought in the first place and go back to distracting ourselves. But a life of distraction is not a very full life, and secretly we all know it. The question is—what are we going to do about it? What will I do about it? At this point, I’m really not sure.
-Snow Whore
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Merskank has been the busiest of all of us lately what with TEACHING at Oxford, writing her thesis, and being a supportive friend, daughter, and girlfriend. Her answer to this question is yet to come.
So there was this guy. I know, I know, for as single as I am (hint: very) I write about boys a disproportional amount. How many crushes and almosts can a girl really talk about before her friends start to worry? But, please, bear with […]
Well, the wedding is over. Deep breath. I easily spent half of my summer working on crafts and support from my friend’s wedding and now that it’s done I feel more than exhaustion, I feel relief. My time is my own again! And while I […]
So I got jealous this week.
For our annual family and friend river trip we went to Desolation Canyon, spending 6 days rafting and drinking with a group of people I dearly love. But when I should have been relaxing and enjoying the phone-free natural beauty of the canyon, instead I found myself feeling what can only be described as pure, unreasonable jealousy. And as much as I tried to fight it, I physically couldn’t shake the green monster. And what scared me the most was the realization that I couldn’t control my thoughts as much as I thought I could.
The person my jealousy was directed at was a friend of ours (for this post I’ll call her Maddy) and while she isn’t a regular member of the group, she has been on these trips a time or two before. I don’t know her quite as well as the others but I’ve never felt anything but love for her in the past. So when I started feeling competitive with her it seemed so shockingly out of place, it didn’t make any sense.
But the thing is it did make sense, it made perfect sense, because you see there is this guy. Well, sort of. Remember a while back when I wrote a post about falling for my friend’s brothers? Well, not the main guy in the post but the other one (the one who out of nowhere became 20 something and tall a few years ago) has become even more of a confusing mess since we bonded a few river trips ago. I’ve been working with him this summer and let’s just say things have gone from a little teasing to a full on flirt fest.
He’s only 22 (I’m almost 26) and there are so many qualities in him that make me confident we wouldn’t actually work long term, but the simple fact is that I’m attracted to him and we get along really well. And when he flirts back, it’s hard to resist. So when I found out he was coming with on our camping trip, I let my hopes get up, thinking that maybe this could be a week where we’d… connect (or something).
The first few days of the trip I was happy and carefree, talking with everyone and enjoying the river that I’d missed. We played cards (I won) and jumped off rocks, ate great food and slept under the stars. He and I found moments together and teased like I wanted; we were even pretty touchy, trying to dunk each other in river wrestling matches and bumping into each other in passing. He gave me a shoulder rub one night and buried me with sand by the light of the full moon. It was exactly what I’d hoped for.
But as the days went on Maddy became more confident and talkative, and suddenly moments that he used to spend standing next to me I’d look up and see him next to her. It was never anything more than a few laughs and an elbow, and he still found time to give me attention too, but they had something and… I was jealous.
She’s a few years older than me and is halfway through completing her dental degree in Portland, so I know that she wasn’t looking for anything more from him than I was, but that was the problem, suddenly she and I were direct competitors for his attention. And I hated it. Hated it because I knew it was unhealthy. Hated it because I really like her and we get along well. Hated it because losing sucks. There was nothing to win here, no relationship or confession of love, this was only a war of insignificant battles that sort of proved who was the most fun person to be around. I’d look at her and ask myself if she was prettier than me, if her tiny frame was more desirable than my larger one, if she was more clever than I was. I questioned my personality, my decisions, my motives. Which one of us was better in this moment? The more I wanted to win the more angry and grumpy and emotional I got, when he’s come to tease me about something I’d be pissed and shut him down, or not flirt back because it took effort to smile at him. Suddenly I couldn’t meet his eyes anymore and seeking her out for a conversation was out of the question. Understandably the more moody I got the less he sought me out and I only felt worse.
I was hard core PMSing and my mother and I weren’t getting along great, so I have some sort of minor excuse for not being able to keep my jealousy in check those last few days, but as much as I avoided them and distracted myself with the other people on the trip, I was hurting. And it sucked because I didn’t want to be. I wanted to just be able to smile and take the good and forget him until another good moment came. Why couldn’t I just be casual? Why couldn’t I just be happy that he liked me best most of the time?
I didn’t give up completely, running my fingers through his hair a couple times and clinging to him for my life as I almost drowned in a water gun fight. I rested my knee against his while playing cards a few nights and while I couldn’t smile at him like I used to, the tension was still there, just less carefree. When we said goodbye I couldn’t bring myself to hug him even though I hugged everyone else. I made up some excuse that I’d see him again before he went back to Chicago for his last year of college, though he and I both knew that was unlikely.
Our saga feels unfinished, and since our families are close and his sisters are my closest friends in Utah, I don’t suppose we’ll ever really be done. But I want to be. Nothing good can come of us, and when I think about it all I really want from him is a second of proof that this wasn’t all in my mind. I know it wasn’t, but I’d like to be able to look at this with him and laugh at that one summer where we flirted. I want to be able to talk to him about it later, and roll my eyes about how little we knew about what was good for us. I know I’ll find someone better, but if jealousy does anything good it does show I care. Maybe it’s time to be a little bit more careful about who I flirt with.
As 20somethings we’re no strangers to failure, often finding ourselves paralyzed by indecision or blinded by ambition. We cringe daily at what we didn’t do and what we haven’t become, what we said and what we believed and yet, as much as we stumble we […]
The idea of a Bucket list has never really appealed to me. It seems like making a list of things to do before you die is so definitive and constricting. What happens if you die without completing it? What happens if you complete it and […]
GUYS! WHEN DID JUNE HAPPEN?!
I feel like I always say this but, seriously, has spring gone by too fast for anyone else? Now that June is here and my Grand Euro Adventure is coming to a close I’m really feeling the pressure of heading back to my ‘real life’ in the states (and finally figuring out something like a career). When I left for Europe I hoped that come June I would have everything sorted out, but here I am a few weeks from home and still no plan in sight.
So for this month’s COTM I’ve asked my fellow princesses to talk about who inspires them and how they hope to inspire others. Maybe by thinking about the types of lives we want to lead we’ll be better able to place ourselves within them. And hey, a little reminder of what matters can’t hurt, right?
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Inspiration! What a great topic. I just went with the first three people who came to mind, though many other people around me have influenced and inspired me throughout my life. To start with, there’s my husband. Cliché, I know, but I really love the guy. He isn’t without his flaws, but as I’ve gotten to know him over the years, as I’ve seen him at his worst and his best, I continue to be inspired. He’s easily the smartest person I know, and the things he’s been able to accomplish academically, in research, and in his career definitely impress me. Along with that, I’m inspired by how hard he works. While I tend to be a bit of a slacker at times, adept at knowing how I can get by with the least effort, he takes work, school, or projects at home seriously, and, as a result, he always produces quality work. He inspires me because he teaches me things, and he’s always trying to learn more himself. He makes me want to work harder and be better.
Then, if I think about famous or noteworthy people in the world that I admire, a name that quickly comes to mind is Malala Yousafzai, the young Pakistani girl shot in the head by the Taliban in 2012, who has since become a world-renowned spokeswoman for girls’ education. She looks just like the students I myself was teaching in October 2012, which is both terrifying and sobering. Malala grew up in rural Pakistan, enduring living conditions I’ll never have to experience, but loved going to school so much she refused to stop, even after receiving death threats. When I look around American public schools, I am awed at the students who will skip school with only the thinnest shred of an excuse. Malala had every excuse in the world not to continue her studies, but she did anyway, and she has never stopped speaking out for her beliefs. She’s inspiring—I’d recommend her book I am Malala for more information about her.
And while we’re on the topic of education, something very close to my heart, I’d like to say that teachers are the third “person” I find inspiring. I’ve known so many great ones who inspired me to pursue my own education and become a teacher. I’ve seen first-hand the work that is required and the sheer amount of crap they put up with, all for the sake of their students. Included in this shout-out are my grandmother, who moved to Cuba in the 1940s to teach and continued to teach high school for decades to help support her family, my mother-in-law, who after doing this job longer than I’ve been alive still puts in more hours than any teacher I know, my aunt, who is still teaching Kindergarten as she nears age 70, and numerous other friends, family members, and coworkers. It’s a selfless job, and they’re generally quite underpaid, but their legacy is priceless.
My hope is that my own students will be as inspired by me as I have been by the educators in my life. At the end of my first year of teaching, my kids showered me with so much love and appreciation. I knew then that I had succeeded in some small part—I had inspired them, and that made every long hour I had spent worth it. In two weeks I’ll see those same students cross the stage as high school graduates, and let me tell you: I can’t freaking wait.
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People I am inspired by? Well, as a Christian, I spend a lot of my life trying (and failing) to emulate Jesus, who was super inspirational. Loving people, caring for the weak, the outcasts, the poor, and not being afraid to stand up to the big know-it-alls of his time. Saying that we need to love everyone, even our enemies. I can’t think of anyone more inspirational.
Finding other examples of inspirational people is harder for me. I mean, almost everyone I know (both in real life and throughout history) has some traits that I find inspirational mixed others I wouldn’t want to emulate. It’s the nature of the human condition—none of us are perfect. However, I would say that recently I have been feeling challenged by those figures in history that were able to do what they think was right without caring a whit what other people think. Think about Martin Luther. Now imagine you were in Luther’s place: breaking from the one holy church—being excommunicated by the Pope whom most everyone believes holds the keys to heaven. Now that takes guts. Serious guts.
I was recently one of his treatise where he declared that he would ‘freely speak my mind’ regardless ‘if any of the Catholics laugh or weep’. I have a hard time stomaching even a hint of disapproval from those around me, and here is Luther alienating the majority of the world. And he doesn’t care. You can feel it in his letters—he surely cares about what God thinks—but wooing the approval of the leaders of his time (or anyone else for that matter) is at the bottom of his list. Now, Luther’s actions are not universally admirable. Beyond not caring what others thinks, sometimes he goes out of the way to insult them with egregious insults and doesn’t seem to put very much into understanding other people or their perspectives (If you think I am joking, try out the Luther insulter and you too can be insulted by Luther: http://ergofabulous.org/luther/ ). So yeah, I wouldn’t say he is a very good example for ‘loving your enemies’. However, I am inspired by his confidence in God. Luther never spent time kowtowing to others or shying away from confrontation—things I am guilty of way too often.
Now finally, the question of whom I inspire? I am not sure. I would say that I try to inspire academics around me by not stressing continually about my work. Of course, I am imperfect at this, and all the time catch myself stressing or obsessing. But I do believe that the kind of general over-whelming sense of stress and gloom that can arise in graduate school is destructive. The end of the world does not occur if you don’t hand in your thesis on time—the end of the world does not occur if your chapter isn’t as good as you’d like it to be. I think it is easy to fall into a false perspective that raises your individual daily trials to a position above all else in your life. After all, if you’re looking there is always something to stress about.
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I love that my parents never stop moving. They came to meet me in Italy for ten days in April and I’ve never been so tired in my life, the three of us running around ruins and cities from dawn till dusk. They work hard and play hard, always managing to stay focused on the present even though their lives are spinning fast. They build closets and gardens on the weekends after bike rides and yoga classes, ski on their mornings off and play poker on the weekends. They have great friends who better their lives and have no trouble connecting with strangers. They get up early and talk about their days, stay up late to finish things for work or a project for their friends. As cheesy as it sounds, I want to be (almost) exactly like them when I grow up. What better way to live your life than to take advantage of the time you’re given?
Sophomore year of high school a new girl showed up and my life has never been the same since. Julia and I had math and physics classes together and her enthusiasm to learn was unlike anything I’d seen. She loves life and so many things in it, talking passionately about film, music, landscape, political change, horses, medicine and writing just to name a few. What I love about her most is that she isn’t just interested in these things she goes after them too, taking the steps she needs to make what she wants a reality. She’ll start a conversation with a stranger and then give them her card, seek out the best in the field and then ask for an internship. She makes things happen and encourages me to do the same. When I’m nervous or insecure about what I want or how to go about it I think of her and know that she would tell me to try anyway. Sure she may change her mind next week and throw herself completely into something else, but isn’t that what life is about, the full on attempt?
But honestly, as awesome as all the real people in my life are, none of them inspire me as much as Spiderman. For the last few months I’ve started to think about Spiderman every day (it’s been easy since everywhere around the world children and adults are wearing Spiderman t-shirts). He’s become a source of strength and responsibility for me, someone who helps me get through hard things and inspires me to have fun while doing it. He reminds me that life is short and I have a duty to be my best self and help when I can, that I owe it to the world to do the many things I’m capable of. Sure, I don’t have to chase through the train station to return someone’s dropped ticket – but Spiderman wouldn’t even hesitate.
But he’s imperfect too, just a kid who is trying his best and never quite fully succeeds. He makes mistakes and is always just a little behind, exhausted because there is always so much to do in a day. Do I always do my best or take the time to do all I can? No, definitely not. But when I think of him I know that next time I’ll do better, that in the consistent attempt I’m making a difference.
I hope I inspire people to do all these things and more. I hope I lead by example, helping people explore their surroundings and say yes to new experiences. I hope the people around me work to see other points of view, and are reminded to be kind, generous and easy going. I hope I’m diverse and strong, intelligent and reasonable. I hope I inspire people to be happy, to see that the world is an incredible and beautiful place.
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I’m sure I could name a lot of famous heroes from history past and present like Mother Teresa or Nelson Mandela who I do definitely admire for their dedication and spirit of love. But the people who really affect me, have the ability to speak into my life and change me for the better, are the extraordinary ordinary people who populate the spaces of my everyday life. So who are these top three people?
(in no particular order)
*** Snow didn’t notice there was a part two to this question so while she thinks about the ways she hopes to inspire other people I figured it couldn’t hurt to write a quick paragraph of my own. I still want to see yours though! Snow inspires us in so many ways. She’s loving and enthusiastic, tough and enduring, raw and openhearted. She fights for what she believes in and forgives in an instant. She takes the time to appreciate the world (and people) around her and she trusts herself to know what is right. She is radiant and intelligent, creative and joyful, unique and loyal. She’s a blessing and everyone is the better for knowing her. She inspires me to show my love for people, because life is so much better when shared.