Forever 21

Twenty-one is a dangerous age, I’ve said so before. I’m not even pertaining to myself the ill-advised things I did. I’m referring to other girls, smart, sensible and beautiful girls—smarter, more sensible and more beautiful than I ever was or ever could’ve hoped to be at that age. None of that matters because, at 21, we are all sitting ducks to any smooth-talking, good-looking, hopelessly alluring bad boy or douchebag that come come our way.

No amount of caveats, admonitions or horror stories will ever deter reckless and foolhardy 21 year-old girls off their doomed path. I, the most reckless and foolhardy of them all, would know.   

Of course losing your head for a boy who is so wrong for you is practically a rite of passage. But at that hapless age of 21, when you are just itching to make daring, albeit stupid, leaps of faith, the douche bag’s charm is at its most potent.

And so it goes, they treat you like crap because they know no better, they make you doubt your worth, they break your heart so bad, thoroughly strip you of all hope for a happy ending and, most baffling of all, they make you believe you’ll never find someone better when in fact they were not even nearly good enough.

Mercifully what I found irresistible at 21 now repulse me. Sometimes I find myself thinking that thanks to them douchebags, I learned what NOT to look for in a man—but I really don’t want to give them that much credit.

Me, 21 and chain-smokin' 

A v. Bridget Jones-y first post

This won’t have New Year’s resolutions, because it’s way too late in the year for that.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. —JANE AUSTEN, Pride and Prejudice.

What is NOT universally acknowledged is the envy it inspires or the panic it stirs if you’re not the wife so wanted.

It’s shameful, really. In this post-feminist world where hooking a husband is no longer the end all and be all of a woman, the news of someone getting proposed to sends me in a frenzy, against my nature and my better judgment. I’m not what you would call husband-hungry, but the alarming number of engagements, weddings and even babies in my facebook timeline has been impossible to ignore. Especially since EVERYONE used to say I’d be the first to get married. A part of me can’t help feeling that I’ve somehow failed and disappointed someone because it obviously hasn’t come to pass. As to who I’ve disappointed, I do not know, not myself though, that’s for sure.

I love the feeling of wanting to be married, but I don’t want to be married yet. I’ve found my prince and I look forward to a lifetime of being married to him and I spend hours daydreaming about it, but neither of us actually wants to go there just yet.

Now if only other people knew that! I’d hate to think that people look at me and wonder what could possibly be so wrong with me that I haven’t been proposed to despite being in a (nurturing and solid, btw) relationship for over three years now. Well, I have been proposed! I am proposed to at least once a week. For now, that is enough. Honest!

I’m too young to take any real offense when nosy acquaintances ask me why I’m not married yet. But please don’t get used to it. It’s rude and if I get sick of it, I might start being honest.

I’m not married and I’m glad for it because I do not want to keep house (yet), I do not want to plan meals (everyday), I don’t even like sharing a blanket, I don’t want My Darling to get used to seeing me without make up and in ratty house clothes, and most of all, I don’t want to get fat, which is what happens to everyone I know who’s ever gotten married!

Even if it means I’ll be burned up, gone for ever

“Ice is cold; roses are red. I’m in love. And this love is about to carry me off somewhere. The current’s too overpowering; I don’t have any choice. It may very well be a special place, some place I’ve never seen before. Danger may be lurking there, something that may end up wounding me deeply, fatally. I might end up losing everything. But there’s no turning back. I can only go with the flow. Even if it means I’ll be burned up, gone for ever.”

"So that's how we live our lives. No matter how deep and fatal the loss, no matter how important the thing that's stolen from us - that's snatched right out of our hands - even if we are left completely changed people with only the outer layer of skin from before, we continue to play out our lives this way, in silence. We draw ever nearer to our allotted span of time, bidding it farewell as it trails off behind. Repeating, often adroitly, the endless deeds of the everyday. Leaving behind a feeling of immeasurable emptiness."

---   Sputnik Sweetheart, Haruki Murakami