My main complaint throughout my adult life has been that while things are changing around me, responsibilities increase, free time decreases and bills pile up, I have remained the same. I have not inched any closer to financial independence or developed an ability to handle bugs or found myself looking longingly at a baby. I feel like I’m a statue in a changing landscape, you know like the accelerated seasonal progressions they do in some commercials?
On my way to work today, I realized that I have actually changed in a few ways that I didn’t notice in the soup of adulthood. One is my aversion to new things and people. Not that I don’t like new people, or well, I do after I meet them. But things that are new provoke anxiety and make me want to keep doing the same things over and over for the rest of my life. I wouldn’t do that, of course. But I remember telling my dad as a teenager that I hated, HATED routine. I didn’t want to do anything repetitive or anything that might form a habit, like cleaning or hanging up my towels. My parents would always tell me how i needed to get into a routine with my life, but I always fought it tooth and nail. I was worried that I would feel compelled to do things like clean and hang towels like a robot, which would be a limitation on my freewheeling ways. Today in the car, I thought about how everything I was used to doing on a daily basis was about to change, and I felt a pang. I actually had this thought: “I can’t wait until I get to Nashville and get into a routine.” Soooo freaky!
Another way I’ve changed is that I’ve become a semi-rigid housekeeper. Mess and disorganization never used to bother me. You can see that if you look at photos of my old dorm rooms. Now, when I walk into a room with things scattered about, furniture askew or not smelling absolutely fresh it’s like a bucket of cold water dumped over my head. I immediately want to straighten everything up and go to town with a bottle of Kaboom. Really I have to resist that urge when I come home late and I’m really tired, because I know the priority should be resting and sleeping. But when the house is clean I feel like the queen of my castle.
The third change is my um, personal aesthetic. I don’t wear high heels like ever. I am always in flats or flip-flops. And I don’t purchase clothing on a whim or in fact, ever. I know ever is a long time, but four months feels like ever to me. All in all, I would say that living in San Diego has made me into a casual, uncreative dresser, which has been half enjoyable and half distressing. When I get back to Nashville I will try to get some of my mojo back.
Fourth, I think about things much more openly and more liberally. I have become more liberal in just about every area. And I have concluded that I don’t have to feel guilty about that. When it comes to theology, especially, I feel like I am moving toward a school of thought that is far more Episcopalian, as Erik and I discussed last night, and less Evangelical, certainly less fundamentalist. Right now, I am 100% turned off by people who think they know everything for sure. Pat answers disgust me. I am hovering over the religious landscape kind of peering down at various clusters and landmarks and not knowing where to land. Everything is in question. Hopefully it won’t always stay that way, but I think that it might for a long time. It’s all negotiable to me right now.
Maybe I am changing more than I thought, and it’s simply less apparent since I’m in my nefarious 20s. Maybe it’s good, maybe it’s bad, but i hope I come out alright in the end.
