on being 20

Jun 6, 2024

I'm 20 years old, but no one seems to believe it, including me.

I still look like a teenager. People ask for my age when I step on the bus or go to the mall, because what if I'm a delinquent skipping school or an unaccompanied minor? They're always genuinely shocked when I tell them how old I am, or show them my ID to prove it. (After enough instances of this, I finally asked my friends, "Do I look like a minor?" Unfortunately, the answer was a resounding yes.)

Maybe it's my face, or my body, or just my energy. Do I just have...young/immature/juvenile energy?? When I look in the mirror, a young girl looks back at me. I'm taller than my mother, but I've never stood like her, or had the capable, no-nonsense aura pouring off her.

I don't know if I'll ever look or feel "grown." I don't even have my driver's license yet because college takes up almost all my time—my major has summer terms every year. And I hate shopping in actual, physical stores, because you have to talk to people face to face (even though all the dread of talking to people disappears when I'm actually talking to them, the build up to it is still horrible). I don't know why I'm like this. Am I the only one going insane whenever I have to do some small task that keeps stuff in my life running? How am I supposed to function in society when all I do is study and stress about studying?

Now that I'm back home for a few weeks, seeing all of my extended family, I feel even more like a child. I think I stopped aging in their eyes when I first moved to the city for high school, several years ago. I'm still Valentine, the youngest, the gifted, the golden girl they're proud of but still can't trust to take care of herself. I love them. I don't know if they're right about that. I hate it.

I'm never going to be 20 again, and I feel like I'm wasting my youth. I don't go to parties—I've never even gotten drunk¹. I take pictures, but I don't take good pictures of myself that I'll want to have when I'm older. I don't go and see my friends outside my university because we're all busy and I don't have a way to get to them. All I do is study and stay up late and cry about it.

I can't seem to balance being a good student, a good daughter, a good friend, and a good person to myself. All these things demand different parts of me, and I'm not sure they fit together at all.

But is it wrong of me to want to be 20 and exist for a little bit? I want to take the train by myself and go wandering around the city. I want to forget about getting my degree for one day and scour the area for the best bakery within reach. I want to go out at night and drink a little and have fun with my friends and take pictures of us, all washed in streetlight gold.

I feel a little guilty just thinking about it. Like isn't this whole post just me whining and being immature? Oh, well. Forgive me. Hopefully at some point I'll look and feel and act my age.

#mirror