A former teenage author turned twenty and her stabs at writing life and living to write.

Sunday, January 1, 2017

The Quarter Life Crisis of a Twenty-Something Is REAL

Let me say this. Mock millennials all you want. Until the sun goes down and yoga pants go out of style. Hey! I'll even join in for a verse of "put that phone back in your backpack or so help me. . ."

But I will say that growing up, no matter your generation, is a difficult time. Maybe that's why it's so easy to poke fun at the rising generation with their misdirection and their superficial emotions and their epic failings. It's not even that the rest of the world doesn't fail; they do. My generation, however, tends to do so with the volume up.

I'm not going to get too introspective and deep here because I think failing and sucking at life every once in awhile is important. It keeps you from having "perfect" syndrome and walking with your arms floating behind you and all the while being completely incapable of understanding empathy. (breath) But does it ever get EASIER? Do you ever wake up and realize, "Oh! I'm still kind of the worst, but by golly I am getting better at failing my life!" (That certainly calls for a ceremonial woot woot)

This last year has been the epitome of my quarter life crisis, and I'm not even sure how or when exactly it began. But it has been something that I have most definitely perpetuated.

I won't get too much into the personal reasons why this year has been particularly difficult, but I will say this. If you see the following symptoms or similar reactions in either yourself or the people you love, you may know someone with QLCS.


I went from a blonde to a "purple-haired freak"
(may or may not be a direct quote)




I bought a house.
And sometimes, I still can't remember what led me to that rather large decision.
On April 1st I started looking (no joke  . . . heh . . . get what I did there . . . Because it's April Fools?)
And on June 10 I signed my closing documents






















I went to Disneyland TWICE!
Hahaha jk. This isn't a symptom of QLCS.
It's just plain awesome!











































All in all, it has been a year of many firsts. It has been a year of self-discovery. It has been a year of realizing that I don't know half as much as I'd like to pretend.

It was the year I had to paint my wooden fence by myself, and somehow proved that I could do it (nevermind the fact that I couldn't stand up straight for a few days). It was the year my best friend moved out and got married. It was the year I bought not one, but TWO shades of blue lipstick. It was the year I saw a mouse in my house and I considered for a good 30 minutes if I could put it up for sale the next day. It was the year I hired every single employee on my team at work. It was the year I made big decisions; some wiser than others.

It has been a year of pushing people away and slowly realizing those who would not allow themselves to be pushed (I owe you so much). It has been a year of feeling love, but somehow feeling more alone than at any other time of my life.

It has been a year of discovering what a home truly is. Not something you can purchase and move into. Unlike a house, a home comes with something far more unique than that. It's something I've sought my whole adult life.

I have a recurring dream every once in awhile. I'm lying on my mother's bed in my childhood home. She's there next to me as I watch the ceiling fan whir around and around. No words are exchanged, but every piece of me is safe and loved. The darkest thoughts and most terrible nightmares could be stalking outside her door, but I somehow know they can't be let inside.

Since losing my mother as a child, I have never been able to duplicate that feeling of peace except for in one place. In His house. In the place I had the priviledge to go nearly two years ago to receive my endowment. In the place where eternal covenants are made and His love is exponential.

It's not that this realization has dramatically changed my experiences this last year or the pain that has been dealt at times. Nor does it solve the problems still in my way. But it does everything a home should do in that it gives me (and everyone who works to achieve it) a safe place to land; a haven to wait out the storm. A place to refocus and refresh.

Let this, if nothing else, by my theme of 2017.