On December 29th of last year, I turned 22. It was certainly a weird feeling, mostly because some days I still feel like I am 18 years old and graduating high school. The year before that was my first year of drinking legally. Turning 21 has a stigma of being a special year because of that reason. Right away, it was exciting getting to experience a bar scene and seeing the inside of a liquor store, but it quickly became something not so “thrilling”…
For some reason, friends of mine that were older than me would tell me to enjoy being 21 because “it’s all downhill after that.” It made me feel slightly pressured that year. I thought what my friends meant was that I had to go out as much as possible before I wasn’t 21 anymore. MYTH.
I want you to know that you have plenty of years and plenty of weekends to have a night out on the town. There should be absolutely no pressure if you don’t want to drink alcohol. I believe many of us can say we learned “peer pressure” was bad in middle school or even younger. This idea is society’s way of saying that you have one year to have fun and then after, you can’t?
I say that is not fair. What is fair is realizing that you are not as young as you were yesterday and if there is something you want to do than do it. Especially if it is something that your 60-year-old self will wish that you did when you were in your twenties.