My daughter turned 18 on Monday.
Eighteen.
*sigh*
A couple of things come to mind upon repeating this, the first being how incredibly stupid I was, those 18 years and 9 months ago. Yes, I got to meet this fabulous kid as a result, but seriously, I was out there 18-odd years ago, doing the stuff that I am now utterly horrified about my own children doing. It is "do as I say, not as I did" in every sense of the expression. I should also add that I was aged 27 at the time my Brand New Adult was born. 27 should be plenty old, and for most people I suppose it is. I think maybe I was just stupider (yeah, I'm using "stupider") than a lot of other 27 year olds. Oh well....the past is the past, and all that.
The other thing that comes to mind, the thing that your mother fails to tell you is that nothing, and I do mean nothing erases "stupider" faster than, yes, raising a child. With apologies to both of my daughters, yes, I'm a lot smarter than the both of you, combined--I've been in school for ages. Soon I will graduate, and unlike you, will get a new car for a commencement gift.
If you care at all, and apply the same work ethic you would if it was a paid gig, being a parent allows you to develop executive-level organization/delegation and negotiation/diplomacy skills.
Of course, you don't get to put that on your resume.
Terribly unfair, I think.
Having a grown child hasn't made me feel old--I have yet to meet the life event that could do that. Michael Jackson once stated that he didn't "feel any age". He said that during an interview he gave when I was a child, and he was at least 20 years younger than I am right now. I wonder if he ever felt any age? Or did he, as I expect, decide for himself what 30, or 40 felt like?
I don't feel any age, either, MJ.
The only place I have felt the slightest bit of my own mortality is in my career, but that's not me, that's just other people having their own limiting ideas of the value of a 45 year old woman. Yes, right around the age when men are starting to run the company, women begin to be harshly judged by the age stick. In case anyone ever wonders why my bathroom cupboard is full of concoctions, that's why. In case anyone wonders why I'm lifting weights and working out and hoping to give the outward appearance of a somewhat hot chick, that's why--to compete with the actual hot chicks. Does this make sense, considering that most or all of those hot chicks are at the level of "stupider" that I abandoned for an executive level education? Of course not. Men are idiots.
Unfortunately, then run everything.
Having a child turn 18 on the same year that I reach an age that can be divided by 5 might be a crushing blow to a lesser person, but I've never been a lesser person, so I'm not going to worry about it. In the idiot-fee zone I'm continuously working to create for myself, there is no room to think less of yourself or anyone else just because of the number of years their body has been on the planet.
Now, if they get to be this age and they're still "stupider", then yes, by all means, judge...
