How to Run a Life

I went out to lunch with two of my good friends, both of whom will be graduating college with me in a few days.  It was a bit of a surreal experience.  All three of us have completed final exams and projects, theses, theatre productions, dance performances, all behind us.  So the conversation did not revolve around our school lives.  Instead, we were three adult women, talking about life in general—“real life” as we called it, life which involves taxes, credit reports, jobs, separation from family and choices based solely upon one’s own desires.  Isn’t that terrifying?

It’s funny how we learn to judge adulthood.  As children, we think that “grown-ups” are the ones who have everything together.  They have all the answers, all the plans and ideas and reassurances.  What a laugh that is!  Then as a teenager moving into college, we begin to think that we are adults, that by choosing a school and moving out on our own, we are making our own choices and running our own lives.  But a life is a complicated machine, and it takes more to run one than staying up all night, eating junk food, and deciding to go to class for once.  College isn’t really a choice anymore: in this society, it’s an expectation.  And thinking back, there was really ever only one college that I chose to apply for myself; the rest were my father’s idea.  Going to college is a big step, yes, but it’s still safe. 

Leaving college, on the other hand, is stepping off a damn cliff.  There are no safety nets—parents are expected to cut you off at this point, and suddenly no one is able to tell you what to do.  There is so little helpful advice for those of us at this point in our lives, because no one in the world knows better than you do what is going to make you happy.  Here is the point where we begin to put our education to the test and, unfortunately, begin to see where it fell short.  How do I get a good credit score?  What do you mean, year-long lease?  And no, I haven’t actually balanced my checkbook this month. 

With all this hanging over our heads, our lunch date was a bit less buoyant than others have been in the past.  But looking at my fellow graduates-to-be, I couldn’t help but think that we will all be fine.  The best way to learn how to do something is to do it, right?  And hard and cold as it might be, life itself is an excellent teacher.  So in three days, I will take that step off the edge, and whether I crash or whether I build a parachute out of my socks is up to me.  Either way, I’ll learn from my mistakes and be better prepared for the next step, and the next and the next.