23 and Me
It was my birthday and I'll be super lame if I want to
Good morning! And welcome to the first ~real~ edition of Kitchen Sink. What an honor to have your attention for a few minutes. I hope this finds you well.
Soooooo, a little belated Happy Birthday to me! What an embarrassing time to be alive. If you’ve sent me a birthday wish, thank you! If you haven’t, that’s okay too!
As I round 23rd base, I decided to dedicate a newsletter to making sense of the funny feeling that seems to surround this particular birthday. Because I spent the day in a vacuum (quarantine hotel room), I had plenty of time to really think about why 23 feels…. weird. Below is my best attempt. I found this topic SO hard to write about because the more I worked on it the more I felt like I was just parsing out loose feelings and saying cheesy words. Parts of it are definitely just unfiltered nonsense straight from my mushy quarantine brain. But I’m curious to hear if it resonates with anyone else feeling weird about the big 23. Or if it even makes sense. hehe.
In July, my good friend Edie first verbalized a thought that had been simmering on the rear burner of my brain for a while….. 23 feels like a really f*cked up age to turn. All birthdays are inherently creepy, but anticipating this one in particular made me feel the same way as being presented with a sushi roll that has cream cheese in it. I’ll eat it and be polite. I’ll like it fine. But there’s something off and I kind of wish we could pretend it wasn’t happening. But beside the obvious hard truth of aging, I struggled to pin down exactly where this “weirdness” came from. I wouldn’t describe it as grief or distress over turning 23, more like somewhere between disappointment, unease and mild dread. A case the heebie-jeebies, if you will.
So I reflected on the handful of years I’ve accumulated, and particularly on what I found to be a transformative 22nd year. And I think the answer (at least, my answer) about the fearful 23 is this: 23 is uncomfortable because it is the first age that really makes me face my insignificance. Very dark and moody :/ But it’s not so bad! I’ll try to elaborate.
Thanks to some very good fortune, I was born on October 26, the eve of Halloween and in the heart of sp00ky szn.
My mother loves Pinterest, so growing up October 26 always included haunted festivities like costumes, brain shaped jell-o molds, and apple bobbing to celebrate the wonder of my birth. But more than just the fun and games, those early birthday parties encapsulated the sensation of being a child and growing up under the watchful and astonished gaze of my parents. Of course back then my focus was on the Sam’s Club cake and neighborhood kids, but in retrospect I can feel the gravity of gaining each prized year. It was in the way my parents would comment on how they “couldn’t believe I was 8 now”, or how their friends would tell them “those young years are so precious”.
Turning eight (or any age), from my petite vantage point, had the impression of being universally important. That might sound narcissistic, but I feel the same way now whenever my little niece’s February birthday comes. I feel a true sense of amazement that Lydia is another year older. It seems genuinely both important and tied up in her identity as a perfect child who is aging too fast, and I tell her that. We all do. I wouldn’t be surprised if, to her, each birthday gives the impression that the world is watching, suspended for a moment in time. And that’s bound to inform a worldview in which she is the center. You can’t blame her. She’s so small!
Anyway, next came all the landmark years. God, the double digits! And then turning 13, which was awesome and then quickly horrifying when my mom started giving me glassy eyed smiles and saying things like “you’re a teen now, you’re almost a woman”. Soon after, 16 allowed me a freshly laminated license and 17 granted official dancing queen status per the supreme law of ABBA. There were accolades associated with each new year, they subconsciously confirmed my suspicion of importance.
A few days after turning eighteen, I Exercised My Right To Vote. Nineteen, 20, 21, each passing with a new ceremonious feeling and evidence of graduating into something grander. In crossing the threshold of 22, I was no longer somebody just barely squeezing past the mark of adulthood, my ID baring the wear of wisdom that comes with being very grown up. Twenty two was always anticipated to be the year of college graduation and entering the Real World. Twenty-two was an age that mattered, and I mattered by association.
But what makes age 23 matter is not predetermined. Without adding a new identity label (teenager, twenty-something), a shiny new form of identification, or the expectation of a major life event, it’s just another age. The first of many other ages that feel like they’re going to blend together into an unappetizing young adult smoothie of irrelevance (my 20’s are making me so delightful). 23 feels insignificant, and by association so do I.
I mentioned at the beginning of this, back when you thought it might be a fun read, that my thoughts on turning 23 were especially informed by reminiscing on my 22nd year. Twenty two was a year characterized by finishing school, leaving the typical structures I had known since I can remember, and commencing into the nebulous “future”. Put simply, it was the year I finally had to lose the rose colored blue light glasses and come to terms with the prospect that I ~might be less important than I assumed~. An uncomfortable experience indeed, but one that I think sheds some light on this mysterious 23rd birthday situation.
So many aspects of growing up seem designed to make you feel very special and hilarious and beautiful and cool. Some of that certainly varies with privilege and situation, but I think a profound (and fairly universal) contribution to that feeling of being special just comes from being young. The nature of being “raised” from infancy to adulthood makes you feel like life is sculpted around your accomplishments, whether that be losing a tooth, learning to ride a bike, applying to college or getting another year older. There is also a pretty shared understanding of what new landmarks might come with each year: another grade level or being old enough to join a sports team or being able to buy scratch offs<3. These things not only keep you in constant anticipation, but generate fairly consistent meaning and value in life.
By age 22, I was practiced in seeing life through the lens of my own growth and accomplishment. I think it would be too simplistic to call that “selfish” or “wrong”. It was more-so a fundamental of my existence from years measuring time in my own milestones.
And then obviously ~college~ did what it does: it ended. And we all had a lot of weird, gross feelings about that. And we moved to different places away from our dear friends that made us feel like our most special selves and tried to get jobs that kind of sort of aligned with our dreams. And it sort of concluded the chapter of life the recipe for which had a lot of value just sort of baked into it.
For me, the next few months went something like this.
With degree in hand, far from the flattery of my favorite professors and the dreaded career center, I discovered that the New York Times wasn’t knocking down my door. I tried to think about what I wanted to do next. I didn’t know. I started to wonder if working for the New York Times is even what I want. Without important dreams, what is going to make me, an important person, happy and fulfilled. I felt nauseous. Is this why people have children? I felt more nauseous. The future was more open than ever, but instead of fun or exciting it was an ever increasing expanse that seemed to go on forever, making me smaller and smaller by comparison.
Although these specific details might be my own personalized nightmare, I know I can’t possibly be alone in these holy-shit-what-now sensations. I know this because I’ve seen coming of age movies. And if coming of age movies have taught me anything, it’s that the hard-to-describe feelings I think I have all to myself are actually trite. Greta Gerwig actually had all of them first.
In my newfound state, on the outskirts of the universe rather than in the center, it felt like I had three options: panic apply to graduate school, become extremely dedicated to some kind of athletic pursuit in hopes of fame, or begin dragging myself through the process of accepting this newfound insignificance. I thought that Greta would probably do the latter and so should I.
Another thing I learned from coming of age movies is that you never find tidy, conclusive answers to how to find happiness and meaning in new life phases. You mostly just flop around until things start feeling right and working out.
It took me months to even get a grip on my post-college, post-childhood thoughts. In that time, I clung desperately to the things that made me feel sane and happy as summer passed and 23 rapidly approached: my hilarious coworkers, ~girls weekend~ camping trips, swimming in Lake Superior. I had dinner on the porch with my parents a lot. I dreamed up some writing ideas. I read some books that made feeling small seem okay. I talked about them with friends. I did insignificant things, like go for walks.
And slowly, navigating a post-center-of-the-universe life started to feel a little better. I didn’t necessarily know if I should accept the imaginary job at the New York Times, but I found a new little framework for seeking meaning right under my stupid 20-something pierced nose: loving the ones you’re with, spending time with your besties, and trying to serve people other than yourself before the flesh rots off your bones. Easier said than done, but a worthy place to start as I shook off the skin of the very important person who inhabited my body all these previous years.
And despite my best intentions, 23 came and like all birthdays it forced me to consider the upcoming year. In the right light, 23 really is insignificant. It doesn’t feel special by design. It’s the first year in a long string of years that’s not necessarily clearly marked by grand milestones. It doesn’t bestow meaning on my life, I have the nasty task of finding that myself.
But what I was left with this October 26 was pretty wonderful. There were some very pleasant chances to have a quick catch up with besties and family members. There was a very delightful text from my friend Jojo in which she said she wished she could put sprinkles on my food (to hell with flavor profiles!). There was appreciation in the fact that now that I’m in these dreaded years, I can find purpose and delight in anything I want. I can place the landmarks where I choose.
There is nothing extraordinarily noteworthy about 23, nothing about it centers me in the cosmic order. But it is a pretty fun time if you just let it have significance to yourself and the people who care about you. I’ve officially decided to induct my niece, Lydia, as the new center of the universe. I think she’s a lot better suited for the job.
Anyway, I celebrated this year by wearing this pink outfit, drinking quarantine beer before noon, and watching my favorite Halloween film (Edward Scissorhands). My parents sang to me on facetime. It was perhaps the best 23rd birthday I’ve ever had.
Literally ENOUGH of my feelings. In other news, here are some bullet points:
I’m furious at myself for not packing some of those caramel apple flavored lollypops in my suitcase. If you have access to them you should go get one right now before it’s too late. I have included a reference photo at the end of this e-mail.
I recently watched the entirety of Gwyneth Paltrow’s new reality show, “Sex, Love, & goop, in one sitting. I wanted to hate it but I didn’t and now I’m having an identity crisis. Everyone was wearing earth tone athleisure clothing.
I have been searching high and low for honey here and all I have seen so far is a massive jar that cost the equivalent of 95 U.S. dollars.
I was feeling over-eager and started writing a second, completely unrelated, half to this newsletter. But then I decided that was a bit much to burden you guys with. So if you come back next week I have a weird amount to say about a specific line on Taylor Swift’s Evermore.
Thanks for sticking with me! Please tell me in the comments what you dressed as for Halloween, I’m genuinely dying to know.
Love -
Ryley
ryley I would like to affirm that I also found it truly Shocking and frankly, Upsetting, when the New York Times did not hand-deliver job offers to our doorsteps right after graduation. reading this newsletter made me feel better about that feeling, and all my other weird being-an-adult feelings!!! hpy scorpio sp0oky szn <3
Every year is a good year! Observe and appreciate the beauty around you. Do some good. Learn more about the amazing cultures, and peoples, that adorn our planet. Be happy, just to be alive.