about growing up

This could be the very minute
I'm aware I'm alive
All these places feel like home

With a name I'd never chosen
I can make my first steps
As a child of 25

-Snow Patrol, 'Chocolate'

For the first time, I feel like I'm growing up. Well, perhaps that's not entirely true, I've felt little moments of maturing before... the day my mom took me bra shopping for the first time, getting my first credit card bill in the mail, getting my driver's license. But the distinction is, for the first time, these changes aren't necessarily against my will (just picture little Danielle being led through the bra section at JCPenny's, crying at the unavoidable tragedy of growing toward 'womanhood'). For once, I feel okay with maturing, with becoming an "adult." 

If a biography were to be written about me (hah!), this chapter in my life would be the 'coming of age' chapter. Sure, generally coming of age movies feature kids around the high school age, but I'm just a little slow in this department. Maybe it just took me longer than most to realize that Peter Pan isn't real, and that aging is inevitable. I was never one of those kids that couldn't wait to be a 'big girl' or 'adult' or whatever... at least not to my memory. I was the girl who cried when she got her first period and used to pray to die before she got too old. Pathetic? Cowardly? Quite. But now I'm slowing getting the picture. I'm aware more than ever of my own selfishness, my own immaturity. I'm realizing that resisting being an 'adult' just hurts those around me. It's just selfish. I need to grow up.

And while I'm still weak to resist the urge to hide when neighbors are over (find a book, hide in the bathroom, nobody's going to question your presence in there for awhile), I still watch Wishbone whenever it's on TV, I still sit upside down on the couch when I want, and I still think 'woman' is a scary and old sounding word, I think I'm finally growing up. Yay, I guess? It's not something I'm necessarily thrilled about, but it's something that I know needs to happen, and it's something I actually want to happen... most of the time. =)