How My Idea of Adulthood has Changed.
I am not a successful adult.
I remember turning eighteen. The joy, the anxiety, the dread.
A collage of teenage me.
I was 5 foot something. Plum highlights in my hair, dressing like a washed-up art student with aggressive eyeliner issues. Accidently matching my clothes to my plum hair. I wish I was joking, plum hair, plum lipstick, plum plaid dress that was too short for school. Trying to hide my anxiety behind a scowl. I did the whole “chip on my shoulder, snarky, bite my ass” bit whilst also being a big ol’ ball of anxiety ready to blow at any moment.
I wore heels every single day for four years. I had watched too many episodes of Pretty Little Liars and thought all women wore heels. I have no idea who I thought I was. Rocking up to sixth form in two-inch heels, bright red lipstick and absolutely no homework done. Usually covered head to toe in clay or paint. I spent every free moment I had, hiding myself away in the art department. Having a million cup of teas and accidently drinking my clay water. No clue how I got away with never going to a single form meeting. It all felt like a daze. Each day that passed was another day closer to starting my degree.
“University is the best years of your life”. I held onto that sentence for dear life.
I was so excited for the freedom that came with being an adult. Alcohol, sex and mischief. I remember the day I moved into my first-year accommodation. The carpet was red, the walls a dull yellow orange. A single bed on top of shelves, a weird wrap around desk. A wardrobe just big enough that you could scrunch up and sit in it. A small, scratched mirror next to the door. My mum dropped me off. A bittersweet moment. I love my mum, but we haven’t always been on the same page. I don’t think I grew into the person she wanted me to be. I watched her leave feeling confused and muddled. I sat on the bed and stared at all the boxes that filled my room. I remember feeling incredibly alone and scared.
When I looked in the mirror, I did not see an adult but a small little girl who did not know what they were doing. I had chosen a degree out of spite. I was told I wasn’t the type of clever to do Classics. I hate being told who I am. Stubborn is probably one of the most used adjectives when it comes to me. I spent five consecutive years at two different universities. I felt like a child for most of it.
I didn’t date until my second year. Covid had ruined my first year. Convenience brought about my relationship. I had the amazing idea to once again date one of my friends. You would have thought that I had learnt my lesson from the last time. He was sweet and understanding until he wasn’t. Until he didn’t want to be. My first adult relationship moved way too quickly, I thought I was doing what adults were supposed to do.
I had grown up getting little snippets of academic valediction. I thrived on knowing I was clever. University stripped that away from me, no matter how smart I was, someone else was smarter. I spent four years wandering around lost, with no purpose except to survive. This is not what I thought adulthood was. I had freedom, I just couldn’t do anything with it.
In my fourth year my relationship ended, and my friends had all graduated. Once more I felt like a scared child wondering how on earth I was going to make friends. I started going to classes full time again and I met one of my all-time favourite people. I spent most of my time at work or writing my dissertation. This was a turning point in my idea of being an adult. I was working, that’s what adults do. They work. I found that working kept me focused and that I needed routine.
I then moved to another city to be with my best friend. Most importantly I started living again. I don’t know when I started cruising through life. Covid had taken away my sense of self. I had become so used to doing nothing and being stuck within four walls. I regret letting life just happen to me rather than participating. I made some wonderful friends, I started a new career, I opened myself up to the possibility of a relationship and I had a healthy social life. Parties, clubs, bars, fun. For the first time in a long time, I felt fun. Hope started to fill me, slowly but surely.
Then it happened. The inevitable crash. In the space of two months, I lost my career and broke my own heart. Now I’m picking up the pieces. I am once again looking in the mirror. I still do not see an adult; I see a confused twenty something not knowing what to do.
My Collage about being an adult.
I have a new mission to be in some way a successful adult by the time I am thirty.
I welcome you to join me on my journey.
Well, what is a successful adult?
Speaking with my housemate we have come up with a list of things we thought made a successful adult at eighteen.
Tidy
Has friends
Have a job
Career that pays them enough money that they can live
Stable relationships
Pets/kids
Cooks real food
I currently can tick off two of those things.
I have friends and I cook real food. I love cooking.
My love of cooking sadly did not come from being an adult. It came from heartbreak. Tale as old as time, a boy broke my heart, and I needed a distraction. Instead of crashing out and demanding to know what I meant to him, I learnt to make soup and bake banana bread. A productive use of my heartbreak.
I find myself awake at three am, laying starfish in my bed, staring at the weird blu-tac mark on my ceiling. Are we all striving towards an unattainable goal? What even is adulthood? Heartbreak and making soups, that I don’t even eat as I forget they are in the fridge. I am convinced most of being an adult is throwing away mouldy leftovers.
I have been contemplating what being a successful adult means to me as a twenty something year old. By the time I am 90 I want to have achieved these following things.
A place of my own
A career/job
Friends
Keep my place tidy and organised
Have plants/pets/kids
Stable, healthy, loving relationship
Healthy relationship with food
Remembering to do laundry regularly
Keeping on top of dirty dishes
Knowing what is in my wardrobe
Eat three meals a day
Skin care
Not be completely reliant on caffeine
A collage of my future goals.
Most nights I speak to one of my closest friends. I watch her nearly every night doing her routine. Each night it is the same. I am totally and utterly fascinated by how she has such a structured, well-maintained routine. Even the way she rubs her face oil onto her pinkie fingers and then onto her face is the same. She is my hero.
I am aware that just because she has a skin routine does not mean she is a fully functioning adult. She is my best friend; I am aware she is not. I love her anyway. I am not so delusional to think that keeping my clothes clean will make me an adult. I think deep down, this is just about feeling normal and in control. I am letting go of the idea that I need to be in a certain place at a certain age which is why most of the goals are a little silly.
This is all personal to me. Every person has a different idea of what a successful adult is. What is yours?