Everyone is 25 and Living a Different Life

At some point in your twenties, age stops telling you absolutely anything about a

person.

Ask five 28-year-olds what they’re doing this weekend.

One is going to a baby shower.

One is at a music festival.

One is touring houses.

One just moved back in with their parents.

And one is currently deciding whether the $14 in their checking account can

support brunch.

Same age.

Completely different Tuesday.

WE USED TO HAVE A SCHEDULE.

For most of your life, everyone moved at roughly the same pace.

Elementary school.

Middle school.

High school.

Graduate.

Maybe college.

There was always a next thing.

Then suddenly:

Good luck.

There is no syllabus for your mid 20's.

Nobody tells you whether this is the year you’re supposed to build a career, travel

the world, get married, move across the country, have a baby, start over, or spend

six months trying to figure out what the fuck you even want.

So everyone picks a direction.

And for the first time, those directions look nothing alike.

THE GROUP CHAT IS INSANE NOW.

Someone sends an ultrasound.

OH MY GOD!!!!

Twenty minutes later:

Does anyone know a good divorce lawyer?

Then:

Who’s going to Space Saturday?

Then somebody announces they got promoted.

Someone else got laid off.

Someone got engaged.

Someone sends a picture of the dog they just adopted.

And somehow all of these things are happening to people who once sat around

the same kitchen table drinking out of red cups.

There is no longer one definition of what people our age are doing.

People our age are doing everything.

AND OF COURSE WE COMPARE.

Even when we know better.

The friend buying a house makes you wonder if you should own something.

The friend traveling makes you wonder if you’re wasting your twenties.

The friend with the great career makes you question yours.

The friend having a baby makes you suddenly conduct a full internal investigation

into whether you want children.

Then that same person might look at your life and think:

Fuck. I should be doing that.

Everyone is somebody else’s evidence that they might be behind.

Which would be useful information if anyone knew where the finish line was.

MAYBE THERE ISN’T ONE.

That’s the part nobody really explains.

There comes a point where life stops happening in the same order for everyone.

Some people meet their person at 20.

Some at 35.

Some never want one.

Someone gets their dream job and quits it.

Someone starts over at 29.

Someone has everything they thought they wanted and realizes they want

something completely different.

The timelines split.

They don’t have to meet again.

And maybe that’s not falling behind.

Maybe that’s just adulthood.

SAME AGE. DIFFERENT LIFE.

Your twenties are weird because you can sit at one table with people living

completely different versions of being grown.

And somehow none of them are doing it more correctly than the others.

The married friend isn’t ahead.

The single friend isn’t behind.

The homeowner didn’t win.

The person starting over didn’t lose.

Everyone is just making decisions with the life in front of them.

So maybe the next time somebody your age does something that makes you

wonder whether you should be further along, remember:

They’re probably looking at somebody else and wondering the exact same thing.