21 Ways I Don’t Feel 22

1. I’m self-conscious about writing this list.
2. I’m actually self-conscious about a lot of things.
3. Although I’ve worked part-time jobs since I was 14, I’m extremely dependent on my parents financially. If that rent check didn’t come through, I would have no home.**
4. I’m extremely dependent on my parents emotionally. My mom asked me if I was religious. I said no. She told me I should believe in something, anything. Therefore when something bad happens, I will have the strength I need to get through it. I told her I call her when I’m upset.
5. For obvious reasons, I compared my life to Taylor Swifts’ upon my 22^nd birthday. I have yet to make millions of dollars, win numerous awards, or date Harry Styles.
6. I would most likely choose dating Harry Styles over the money or awards.
7. Lena Dunham. Jennifer Lawrence. Mark Zuckerberg.
8. I still compare my life to others’.
9. I’m okay with shameless self-promotion.
10. If you didn’t click that link, or you skipped over #6: I love a certain boy band.
11. I use the word, “love,” rather loosely; i.e, “I LOVE HIM,” does not literally mean that I’ve fallen head-over-heels in love. It probably means he said, “Hi,” to me once.
12. I ask my friends to do my makeup, which includes mascara, and maybe a little eyeliner, IF I’m feeling fancy.
13. Remember how anxious you felt talking to your fifth grade crush? I feel like that around attractive men on a regular basis.
14. I’m pretty sure some 14-year-olds would intimidate me if I met them.
15. I feel like an under-age poser when I go into non-college bars. Seriously, I am not old enough to be carrying on a conversation with a man with a beard and a job on Wall Street.
16. I have yet to come up with an appropriate or interesting response to the age-old question, “What’s up?”
17. Someone is, fingers-crossed, going to hire ME for a real-person job in the near future. (If you are a future employer reading this, I promise I’m a hard-working, driven, professional 22 year-old, who is writing this purely (fine, mostly) for the entertainment of others.)
18. Chicken patties and Ramen noodles make up 90 percent of my diet at school.
19. The other 10 percent is made up of chewy, fruit-flavored, vitamins.
20. I see pictures of old-classmates raising multiple children, and I cannot fathom being responsible for a whole other human-being.
21. My palate has yet to mature in order for me to genuinely enjoy a glass of wine or an IPA.

But after writing all of that, I remembered that I am an independent, college-educated, healthy, unattached 22-year-old woman, who has also done some pretty cool things with her life, and has the ability to go anywhere or do anything she wants. And 22 is a pretty awesome/terrifying/exciting age to be.

**Note that I am still in college, and I will in fact be cut off after graduation in May.