Tonight I was going to do my normal thing and watch something on the t.v at 9. But what I wanted to watch wasn’t on and so I thought I would spend the time writing a journal entry rather than shift through channels watching things that I would never have chosen to watch!
I was thinking earlier that one of my favourite parts of growing older, well teenage older, was realising that all those things I worried were weird about myself were not weird at all and actually true for a lot of other people. There were weird things not so common, but it was also a realisation that was ok too. Now I keep getting these realisations, often in memes on the internet, and it makes me feel so much more human and all in a good way. I like seeing the similarities and I like that I don’t feel so different from the rest of the world anymore. I don’t know why I ever did. Did I change or was I just way too worried about silly things that were really ok? I am thinking it’s the latter and if I could write a letter to a much younger version of myself it would definitely have a paragraph or two about not worrying so much about being different and not fitting in. I would explain that infact you do and yet you never will and worrying about it will not change it one little bit. Instead I would advise her to use all that energy on just living and doing the things she wanted to do, not what she thought was expected because it wouldn’t take long to realise that nobody really did expect that much as they were busy living their own lives and thinking about the millions of things that were going on in their head!
Andrew and I were talking a lot about when we used to flirt with each other. We didn’t really flirt for too long. The flirting turned to dating and the dating turned to love really quite quickly. We do still of course flirt, but it is different. It has to be different because if I wondered if he really liked me or not then our marriage would really need shaping up! I do miss those butterflies, I do miss learning new things and I do miss that rush of excitement about how well we go together. I do miss it, but I also love what it has become and that we can still have cheeky flirting texts!
I guess this thinking has come about because we were helping a new student settle in the ward. I mentioned my days at uni, but it felt so far away that this weekend I have felt a little older and a little more far removed from the excitement and nervousness of starting uni. I caught glimpses of it, but if I am honest with myself I was thinking more about the impending uni time for my kids rather than the memories of my own times. I was at uni about 15 years ago and the truth is that in 15 years all my kids will have been or will be on missions or at uni!
It is a strange feeling because I know I am getting older, I can feel it in my body and in my thinking, but not all the time. I could name a lot of ways in which I feel older, but I can also name a lot of ways in which I feel like a younger me still. Andrew is the same (as me in thinking and not the same as he was when he was younger ha ha).
I envy the kids in discovering this part of life. I envy the excitement of it all and I envy those new feelings when they learn something about the world that makes sense. I envy them, but I wouldn’t want to do it all again. I am much happier in my own life now, which I have because of those experiences. I wouldn’t change them, but I wouldn’t want to relive them!
What I find really funny is something I read on the internet the other day, something that proper summed up life…it went something like this…early to bed, not going out, not going to a party…my childhood punishments have become my adult goals ha ha.
Saying that…I am looking forward to the ceilidh at the weekend!!!
