January 25, 2009

• Know me

  I can't remember what it was like to be 18. I suppose I vaguely remember the year, 2001. My freshman year of college. I turned 18 in October, 2 months after meeting new people and living in a dorm in an urban setting. Prior to that year I'd only ever walked around in Philly, hung out on South Street  and then promptly headed back to New Jersey via the Patco train because neither I nor my friends drove. I turned 18 and my new roommate and my floor mates baked me a cake, made me a sign that said Happy Birthday! and stuck it to my dorm room door. I turned 18 and felt important and loved and....free.

  But I don't remember what it was like to be 18. I don't know that girl. I can't remember what it was she thought about on a regular basis, the inner monologue, the worries, the little crushes. I can't relate to her morals, to her political point of view. I don't know how she felt about abortion, about poverty. I can't recall who she admired or why. I can't quite put my finger on how she felt about every day things. I can't remember when she stopped hating snow, and yellow school buses. I can't remember when she stopped yearning for 'home' and realized that this was it. I really do feel like a different person, like me at 18 and me now wouldn't get along, could never relate.We would, at the very least, exchange some snarky conversation. If she is anything like 18 year old me, I imagine my teenage daughter will relish my presence.

  And yet our youth lives in all of us. I still eat Cocoa Pebbles almost religiously (it might be an addiction, much like the one I have to chapstick...dear God, someone get me an intervention...). After years of hiatus I still love Nicholas Brendon and James Marsden from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Actually, I still love Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the TV show, not the movie), cheesy season 1 and all. I still get tingly when I see Mel Gibson in Lethal Weapon 1 (and 2 a little). I still squeal like a little piglet when something is cute beyond reason. I still adore Wawa (unless you live on the east coast somewhere near the tri-state area you'll never understand why Wawa is better than 7-11, though visiting both results in oddly smelling clothing). I am a bit like that girl, still.

  And I do remember some of the bigger things. I remember love, realizing that I was in it without having paid attention to it at all, and arriving at that conclusion a little astonishingly. I remember the sweetness of it, the tickle, the burning. And I remember the ache. I remember some pains too, heavy and purple colored, and oh so consuming.But these memories have no words, no thoughts. I remember them all almost independently of the girl who felt them. I remember them, enshrine them. They'll remain for years. But I think the girl is sort of diminished. Not in a bad way really; I did not forget her on purpose. But I am different. I am not her. Not really.

  But because of her I am me.

  • 6:35 pm
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