Your How Old?

            “WHAT? Your how old?” yelled the eighteen year old friend of my roommate’s when I told her my age. When did twenty-six become old? As a twenty-six year old woman living in the dorms of a major university some days you can feel the years creeping in. When I was eighteen I had a few friends who where in there mid to late 20s’. I would think they had plenty of time to get married, have a career, or have kids. They would talk to me how they should be farther in life and how they felt lost or behind. I thought they were crazy. In my mind age was just a number and as long as you were living your life for the moment then who cared what society thinks and what other people think you should be doing with your life. Fast forward eight years, I’m twenty-six, single, and a sophomore in collage living with people straight out of high school. Sure most days there is hardly a noticeable difference between myself and the younger students. We have a connection with the same goal in mind that evens the playing field. The average student usually never even knows I’m eight years older than them. Until I listen to there conversations about there lives and I realize they haven’t even begun to live. They are all standing at the beginning of life and looking forward to a future that looks so far away and not that important yet. They all want that future or at least know something will change someday but they aren’t at the place were they realize they have to do something to get to that future and they want that future, whatever that future is, badly. I was in collage looking for a future and I was surrounded with people who didn’t even know they were supposed to be looking for one. Not to say I would want to be them again with the constant pull of uncertainty of who you are and who you should be. Nor do I fell like I know more because I’m so much older and lived so much life, but I do know that your view of the world changes so drastically between eighteen and twenty-six. I remember looking forward and seeing my older friends and wishing I was where they were in life and wondering how in world did they get to that point. Now being at that point I am stuck between my youth and full fledged adulthood. My heart is ready to move forward but my head is completely confused. My head is still working in a childish view of adulthood but my heart is pushing me to have roots and expand. With this battle happening within I can't help asking myself, "Your how old?". Realizing I have no idea how I got here and how to move forward.