From Her Perspective

So I have a pretty monumental birthday coming up next week, and as such, I have begun to take stock of what is really important in my life.  There have been many changes: a move to a foreign land called the North Shore, a new job, the realization that I prefer regular bacon to candied bacon (there, I said it, I feel so much better), and now this birthday.  I remember fondly an article that Pete Manzo wrote a while back talking about the various ages when you have to stop doing things.  Like, I think you have to stop dinking orange soda when you’re 35 and stop ordering prostitutes when you’re 41.  Anyway, since I spend most of my time thinking about Manzo, I thought an appropriate homage would be a piece regarding the things that change as you celebrate the birthday I am turning.  And no, I’m not saying what that is.

Kids that you work with won’t talk to you on the train because you are An Adult.  I was on the train one morning last week and I saw a kid that I work with.  He’s a recent college graduate and though we aren’t best friends or anything, we are friendly enough.  I went to wave or whatever (like I’m going to spend a whole train ride talking to him, I have important business to take care of on my commute; namely texting inappropriate things to Jerry Thornton) and he pointedly ignored me!  I was mortified, and then I remembered that when I was 22 I never would have gone up and talked to some random old person that I worked with.  Of course, at 22, I was too busy being sexually harassed by my mustachioed boss to have time for anything else.  Ah, the good old days…

When I buy boxed macaroni and cheese at the grocery store, I pretend it’s for the kids I don’t have.  Now I am sure nobody would care if they knew it was actually for me, but for some reason, I think I’m way too old to be eating this.  And of course I always have to make a comment about how my kids love the stuff, and I wish they’d eat more organic foods.  What?!  I don’t pretend that it isn’t stupid; it’s just what I do.

Dressing like a slut at my age is pathetic and sad.  When I was younger, I could wear whatever I wanted (thanks, bulimia!), no big deal.  If a dress was too short, good!  If a top was too low, great!  Now, it’s a whole different story.  Nobody wants to see it anymore, which was a sad and shocking revelation that left me sitting in a gutter with a bottle of Jack and a wheel of cheddar, which I assure you is as lame as it sounds.  I’m working through the pain, but I am sure the public as a whole will benefit from this revelation.

I was reminiscing with my friends about kamikaze shots.  Reminiscing, you see, because I haven’t had one of those since I was 20 years old.  Do kamikaze shots even exist anymore?  I kind of feel like they are some sort of mid-to-late nineties aberration – that and Bacardi Limon and Sprite.  There is no way anyone still drinks that, because it’s the most awful thing ever.  Even if they do, I’m not having any, because I’m too damned old.  I maintain, however, that gin and Mountain Dew, my drink of choice in college, is still delicious and I will never, ever give it up.  So there.

Listen, guys, turning twenty-five is a big deal and a big responsibility.  Well, at least it was when I celebrated that birthday five years ago.  And I’ll always be younger than Uncle Buck.  I guess it’s not all bad – people let me sit down on the train because I look so wizened and frail, and going to dinner at five o’clock saves a ton of money.  And I will finally have my biggest dream realized: my birthday party will feature a six-foot party sub.  If that wasn’t worth the wait, I don’t know what is.