By Marie Bombeck
I could be Jane in that sentence. Actually, I am Jane. I show up to work at my full-time job where I sit at my desk. I go on lunch break exactly at noon and I clock out at 5. The regularity of it all is awesomely boring. But the key word in that sentence “appears.” I definitely can pull off an adulting façade. Adulting is a definite #thestruggleisreal situation. I mean c’mon, who decided that when you reach a certain age, your life is supposed to be all figured out? And if so why? Why can’t we all be hot messes? I opt for this option. If I have a free pass not to fix my hair, I’d take it. But, I am pretty new at this whole real world, adult life situation. Just recently I realized that I could be considered adult. Just wait, it will happen to you. It is such a gradual transition that you don’t even realize it is happening. One day, almost everyone will have this moment. You wake up and think “Oh (insert choice cuss word here), I am an adult.” It was time to be responsible or something. My sister visited me last weekend and asked me a question I am sure we have all asked ourselves. “Marie, do you feel like an adult?” Gut response? Nope, not at all. Most days, I feel like I am pretending to be an adult. I really don’t think that I have it figured out at all. I am floundering around trying to find my way. Is adulting really this hard? Am I the only one this lost? Am I the only one that hasn’t figured this out? When you go away to college, you want to believe you are an adult. You want to be considered an adult. You fight for your independence. You try to take steps on your own. But really I think we were all highly functioning hot messes. But then you graduate. You look for work. You find work. You get married. You get cats. You get responsibilities and it is all new unfamiliar territory. You don’t quite know the hacks yet. And you wonder to yourself, why did I want this so bad? It is really quite horrible. Maybe it’s just me, but at least once a day I am quite certain that I don’t know what the heck I am doing. But does anyone really have their whole life figured out? Does any adult have their whole act together? So can someone show me the well-adjusted functioning adult? Show me and I will eat my next words. I believe that there is not a true functioning adult. We are all just figuring it out as we go. At least that is what I would like to believe. If this is not the case, I may be quite doomed. So raise your glass to fake adulthood, where we appear well groomed and here is to most definitely figuring it out as you go.
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By Marie Bombeck
I am a planner. I always have been and always will be. I am the queen of to-do lists and scheduling. I like to organize my life in micro details. I plan every aspect of my life. I am the girl that always has an idea on how my life should work out and a plan to get there. It may be ever-changing, but one thing is constant, I have planned it all out. I follow the steps and I will get to where I want to go. I do realize that I live in the real world and I can’t just plan myself out of any situation. But boy, I should get points for effort. I get caught up in planning the plan that is to be my life. One phrase that has never described me is “go-with-the-flow.” I try to plan myself out of any situation. When my life goes awry, I do everything in my planning powers to create a plan that will solve all my problems. I like structure. I like knowing what my next step in life is. I like living in the boundaries. I like coloring in the lines. But lately, life hasn’t been following my plan. Don’t get me wrong, it is working out, probably for the better. The path I have been led on is definitely a path I should be on. However, the principle of the matter is that it didn’t follow the plan I laid out for myself, and if I am being perfectly honest, that scares me to death. And when I find myself in unfamiliar territory, I start planning a plan. But what is that saying? You know the one about life and plans? “Life is what happens when you are busy making plans.” But the planner in me sometimes has a hard time seeing the beauty in my unstructured life. But when you are too caught up in the plan, you miss the life lessons you are supposed to be learning, the good things that can happen when life doesn’t go as planned. It has been my New Year’s resolution to stray from my life plan a bit. (See my previous posts, Letting life take you where you need to be or Putting a little more faith in God.) Clearly from past posts, letting go a bit is something I need to work on. However, I have learned to slow down enough where I can enjoy the small bumps in the road. Like even if you don’t get your dream job right away, you got to make the most of where you are in the moment. There are new friends to be made, new things to learn. Because there is a lot more life to live, you abandon where you think you are supposed to be and enjoy where you are. Forget the plan. Throw your hands to the sky and live your life. See where life will take you. Stray a bit. Come back to reality, and then stray away again. That sounds scary, doesn’t it? But hey, maybe something beautiful could come of it. Forget the plan. Live your life. I dare you. |
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September 2018
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