Adulthood. Who didn’t love their 18th birthday? You go out and buy a lottery ticket, maybe get a piercing without needing your parents’ permission; the world is your oyster. Then your 19th birthday arrives, and you’re still on your ‘I’m an independent adult’ high. But when your twentieth birthday comes, the gears begin to shift, and you start counting down the days… 365 to be exact. The big 21: the day that you never thought would come quickly enough. I’m sure you’ve dreamt about when you could walk up to the bar, slap down your ID, and order your $3 Bud Light. But between 18 and 21, there isn’t much you can do. The fact of the matter is that you’re stuck.
Don’t get me wrong, freshman year of college is a blast. New faces, easier classes, and loads of fun. Most of you are living on your own, finally free. The one thing that no one tells you is that whether you’re 18, 19, or 20, anyone older than the legal drinking age will refer to you as a ‘baby.’ No, not because you wear diapers and suck your thumb, but because you’re limited. Even though you pay bills and rent, and wear suits to interviews with a professional resume, you’re limited in obvious ways, like not being able to have a beer with your legal friends. There are so many other ways too.
Let’s say you’re sitting at home and you call up your BFF Jill, and you both want to go on a road trip. The only problem is that neither your ’88 Buick LeSabre nor her ’98 Jeep Wrangler will make it more than a couple hundred miles without giving up. Guess what? Unless you’re 21 years old, you can’t rent a car. For some people, that’s not much of a problem. But for students wanting to travel home for the holidays, a special event, or just travel in general, you would have better luck standing on the side of the road with your thumb in the air (and I definitely would not suggest that).
So you move on from not being able to travel cross country just yet, and that’s okay. Maybe you have a different dream in mind. You could be like Rachel Marie from Minnesota, who instead of celebrating 21 with alcohol, celebrated with an application to be a licensed foster parent. She shared her dream-come-true with a post to Facebook, and encouraged others to do the same. She actually became the youngest foster mom that her county has ever licensed. At 21 years old, she became part of history. But the fact of the matter is that she couldn’t do that until she was 21.
I’m sure a lot of you are just going to think that we’re being bitter, and of course we are a little bit, but it’s more bittersweet than anything. You find some of the best friends you’ll ever have, make some of the craziest memories, and try the hardest to make your dreams come true. And if you’re lucky, the day you turn 21, when you’re out of the twilight zone of being 19 and 20, you get to turn those dreams to reality.
Sources:
Rachel Marie’s Facebook post: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10207874564126179&set=a.25592795…
Images:
http://glassduffle.com/roadtripmore-part-two/
http://www.teenink.com/art/photographs/17450/Stressed-2/
http://www.cosmopolitan.com/career/advice/a31240/times-its-okay-to-name-…
http://www.cengagebrain.com/blog/2014/05/create-a-bucket-list-to-make-th…
http://www.awesomevillas.com/blog/2013/07/22/what-to-look-for-in-a-phuke…