When we're young, we tell everyone we're 4 and three-quarter. We can't wait till we're older. We dress up in our moms' shoes. As teenagers, we wear the kind of outfits that require our parents to tell us we're "not going out like that."
In college, we celebrate our birthdays like they're Y2K. Post-degree, our hangovers are worse, and we calm down a little bit. Then we hit our "late 20s."
My best friend, Abby, was in the bathroom at a bar when an early 20s came in and, while in the stall, told her equally young friend, "There are so many old b*tches here tonight."
She then ran into my friend at the sink, where the girl scoffed and said, "Sorry," in the tone you once used in forced sibling apologies.
Abby's 27.
It's hell getting older... and we're still young. If it's this bad now, what happens we hit 30? Do we suddenly melt, Wicked Witch of the West style?
There are times in our lives when age doesn't matter:
On the playground = Not important. You consider anyone over 15 old.
Middle school = Important.
High school = It's everything. It can be that fine line between having mommy drive you to school and carting your friends around.
College = Less so... except when you can't yet go to the bar with your 21-year-old friends because you are 20.9 years old, fake IDs notwithstanding.
Post-college= Doesn't matter. Everyone is equally lost.
Late Twenties = Panic attack. You've been to an inordinate number of baby showers. You go to a friend place, where she lives with her HUSBAND, and it seems like they're playing house.
It's 2013, yet there's still this idea that we're damaged goods if we're not settled down by 30. But freaking out over "finding a husband" seems a little too Jane Austen for me. I'm at the bar, contemplating whether I was born in the wrong era when a man sends me a drink. All right, so he has a couple years on my father. That doesn't affect the alcohol content.
Plus, I'm an old woman now; I have to take what I can get.