Ahh, here we go again. The 6 month mark of my last birthday has come around again (the mark was actually two weeks ago, which doesn’t help) to haunt me with its mid-year existential crisis. It’s a state of terrifying limbo, where my being just as far away from my last birthday as the next one reminds me of my mortality, and my outspoken fear righteously pisses off all my older friends who are a little ahead of me. As a form of self-reflection and possibly ineffective goal-setting, here’s a list of things I want my future self to achieve before fully settling into adulthood.
Knowing what separates a good wine from a bad one
If I had to play a game of fuck/marry/kill with my current relationship with wine, it would go like something along the lines of: fuck Merlot, marry Rioja, and kill my generalised preconception of these two styles, as it only prevents me from trying new red wines that probably and most definitely top the ones I’ve had so far anyway.
I picture myself sitting at a dinner table (my own dinner table in fact, which adult me will use as more than just a dumpster for letters, trash and other things I couldn’t be arsed to properly put away) with three close friends, post-meal and pre-intellectual conversation accompanied by glasses of wine. It’s not that we’re sitting around like snobs, pretending to be the four horsemen of philosophy and provoking thoughts. However, the idea of getting out a good bottle of red wine (which has obviously been breathing prior to the first pour) without any announcements of how good it is and then seeing people’s faces light up mid-conversation seems like the peak of maturity. After, of course, other things such as getting a mortgage, let alone financial stability, kids, or other things that genuinely contribute to one’s quality of life.
Being more than mediocre at five recipes or more
Has the art of handing over family recipes died out yet? Can we blame our destructive love for takeaway food that compromises on nutritional value with taste and a higher chance of life threatening diseases? Or is there any hope at all? Even though I was never given any dishevelled pieces of handwritten recipes, I’m hopeful that there will come a time at which I will have developed at least five recipes I’m confident to feed more people with other than myself. Even if that means going beyond cooking “improvisational dishes” (pot-noodles, scrambled eggs, beans on toast, any Thai food etc.) and spending two hours in the kitchen cooking for 15 minutes of consumption. I might take notes for it on my phone.
Knowing when it’s worth speaking up
Until this day I’m still surprised I could get away with unashamedly asking everyone about everything, to the point where I asked two smokers if they knew about the health risks of tobacco (all my four year old self received was a laugh and a metaphorical pat on the shoulder of my naivety and bluntness.)
Today, I’m less prone to talk to strangers about their lifestyle choices, but there is still a lot of wisdom to accumulate in terms of knowing when a question might become the catalyser for a pointless argument, and whether me questioning something will actually do me more good than bad. Also, playing devil’s advocate seems like a fun activity that can potentially provoke philosophical debate, but hardly any lawyer defending a criminal has ever walked out of a courtroom with many fans. Unless I’m defending someone like Ted Bundy of course, as that might always land me a role in a film later, who knows?
Knowing when to stop drinking to prevent myself from passing out in my bed fully clothed
I’m not a big drinker. I hardly ever get paralytically drunk, and often make my fourth drink the last one. However, the times that I do get paralytically drunk, it probably ends with me crawling underneath the covers of my bed like a wounded soldier seeking for protection. Or perhaps more like a vulnerable turtle returning inside her shell. I have a feeling that part of becoming a mature adult is letting myself go once in a while, but in a responsible and controlled way. I want to come home with such ease and calm, that washing my face and brushing my teeth before bed almost makes me feel like I went to a spa after a night out. Also, I’d happily live the rest of my life taking my bra off every time before falling asleep please and thank you.
Finding THE perfect haircut (or learning how to reinvent myself without suffering from haircut-cringe)
If you don’t have any form of documentation of different hairstyles attached to your previous alter-egos, have you even lived? I wish hair wasn’t everything, but it kind of is. It reminds us of who we are or at least who we want people to think we are. A good hair-day can make us feel like we’ve got our shit together, whereas a bad one will make us question our own adequacy and lack thereof. I truly hope that becoming an adult means that I will look back on a previous hairstyle without cringing, and rather accept it as part of who I was, a sign of growth. At no point do I want adulting or growing up to be synonymous with a plateau of self-expression, but a little less shame about the arrangement of some dead cells growing out of my head would probably make life just a little less nerve-racking.
Stop using bath bombs and facemasks as a form of procrastination in the name of “self-care”
If there is such a thing as counterproductive self-care, then I’ve definitely mastered it. It’s a new form of procrastination, in which I basically make myself belief that I’ve suffered enough and deserve better. What I’ve really suffered from other than the usual human condition, and what I deserve, is still a bit unknown to me though. Thank God that the self-help industry, which only really helps itself and capitalism, has an idea of what I might need, and most importantly, spend money on. As I cook my skin in a hot bath and put chemicals on my face, it almost feels like that blank document on my laptop is writing itself. And just wait until I’m done with my self-care routine! Not only will I feel pampered and zen, but I will be even more than ready to attack my work until I decide to get up and clean the kitchen instead. At least that’s one thing ticked off my to-do list.
I can’t wait to get older so I’m able to perform all of these tasks with confidence, only to realise that living itself is about constantly attempting to get your shit together. In which case, bring me the cheap wine, some takeaway and a face mask, because what is adulting anyway?
Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash