seventeen

So, I turned 17 last Thursday.

Here's the deal with this birthday: it didn't begin as a good one. For some reason, I was prepared to face it with the utmost of my negative energy. I wasn't having a party, I turned off Facebook notifications so that the majority of my friends wouldn't remember, I didn't remind my family members, and I was fully ready to spend the day doing ACT prep and procrastinating.

Obviously, I wasn't very happy. Which must frustrate you, as it frustrates me. Because here's the utter contradictory nature of my attitude towards my 17th birthday - I wanted no one to acknowledge it so that I could fully justify all of my self-pity, all of my self-projections of, "Oh, no one's going to remember or even care," but I also desperately wanted someone who would.

I don't know why I'm like this. I guess it's enough to say that sometimes, I'm a mess.

My negative attitude towards birthdays aren't simply geared towards self-pity though. Birthdays are too demonstrative of the passage of time. They show me, clearer than ever, that I am losing all of the precious time through my fingers and I am not getting a second of it back.

I'm 17. I'm older now. I'm almost at an age where I won't be considered a teenager or a kid anymore. I think about my age and I have to remember, I'm no longer a little kid. I won't be able to use my immaturity as a crutch anymore.

If anything, I think I suffer from the Peter Pan syndrome. Because growing up means responsibilities, and if there is anything I wish for myself in the future, it's a lifetime of carefree freedom. And how much of a little kid wish is that?

I just feel a lot of crushing weight, I guess. I'm getting older but I don't feel like I'm getting any smarter. If anything, I might just be getting a little bit more self-centered and selfish. I'm full of impending panic that I need to be wiser and of a better temperament, but everything I say (or don't say) and do are just...so full of my naivete. Truly, I have no experience with the world.

I don't think I deserve to be 17.

I watched a film once, called An Education. It starred Carey Mulligan with Nick Hornby's screenplay. I liked it; it was an interesting, thought provoking film.

In that film, Jenny, the protagonist, goes through her own coming-of-age story. At the end of it all, she faces her teacher with her consequences and says this:

"I feel old, but not very wise."

Maybe that's it. I do feel older. I feel more weary, which is ridiculous because I'm 17. But I also feel sick of the world, or at least the world around me, and I feel tired, much more often.

But at the same time, no, I don't feel very wise.

Ah, well. I guess that's what they call aging. And it is a sign of age, I guess, that I do actually feel this process of getting older and the consequences of the passing of another year.

I just don't feel ready to deal with it yet.

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How do you feel about birthdays? Do you still feel the crushing responsibility of age? Let me know below.