Twentysomething

Having recently and once and for all firmly crossed over the amorphous milestone that marks the beginning of the "twentysomething years," I find myself spending a lot of time these days thinking about just what it is that these years of life are supposed to mean. What they're for.

The twentysomething years, I think, are both a blessing and a curse. You're finally a full-fledged adult, able and required to do all the things that adults can and must do. You're able to structure your life, your job, and your relationships in any way you please. But at the same time you also feel the urge brought on by the youth in these years - namely, the urge to avoid all of the above "adult" things like the plague. You realize that - gasp - you really ARE growing up, and fast. Suddenly it's apparent that you'd better cram in all the fun and carefree adventures you didn't have as an irresponsible teenager, because in less than a decade you too will be married with children and a mortgage and taxes and a job and most likely shackled to one geographic location.

Maybe that's the reason I can't stop thinking about how badly I want to go back to Germany these days. It seems that over the past week or so all I've been able to do is daydream about how wonderful it would be to literally pack up and move there - for a long time. Sharing this thought with my mother, the following conversation took place:

Mom: You can't go back to Germany.
Me: Why not?
Mom [only half-joking]: Because. You have to find a nice girl and get married.
Me: They have girls in Germany too, mom.
Mom: I know. That's exactly the problem.

(Perhaps this is also a convenient time to mention that one of the other unnerving developments that comes with the early twentysomething years is the terrifying barrage of questions from every conceivable family member about one's current, up-to-the-minute marital status. I strongly suspect that if there are hormones or chemicals released into the brains of early twentysomethings that encourage behaviors of independence and freedom, there are equally lethal hormones and chemicals released into the brains of said twentysomething's elders that produce within them the irresistable desire to ensure the survival of the family name as swiftly as possible.)

That said, i continue to toy with the idea of moving to Germany in December, Lord willing. There are many benefits to such a move, which I will have to enumerate later and in some other post because it's now 11pm and therefore my bedtime. (Yes, even twentysomethings have a bedtime.)