One Over X News

What's For Dinner?

Grown-up: aka maturation, a condition a defined by one, all or a combination of the following:

1) You live outside your parent's house.

2) You pay your own rent/mortgage payments or own your house/condo outright.

3) You are married and living outside of your parent's house or your spouse's parent's house.

4) No one ever asks you where you have been all night (except for your spouse) or in the case that you work third shift, your other boss.

5) You at least attempt to pay all your bills on time.

6) No one cooks for you. No one cleans up after you. And you either eat out a lot and wear disposable clothing or you do it all yourself (or share the responsibility with your spouse).

I think the later definition is key. If you walk into your abode and have no one to ask 'what's for dinner' and you have to make it yourself or alternatively you are making dinner for someone else whether it is a child or a spouse, you are a grown-up person. It may be that you are cooking because it is your turn or you cook in a way that is edible and in the interest of public safety it is your agreed to role. It may be that because you cook well all the laundry belongs to the significant other in the abode or it is part of the on the job training assigned to the children.

I know how to cook...well, sort of. At least no one had died from a meal that I have prepared and I have been told that some of the meals are quite tasty. I know how to do laundry and have even figured out the riddle of the white and red stiped clothing and what to wash with such things. Soultion: don't ever buy the garment in the first place, convince yourself that it makes you look fat or silly. You'll be better off int he long run.

I used to think that I had matured too fast. I had my own place when I was fourteen. I was trustworthy, too. After all, I was quite the nerd in my day. But I didn't start supporting myself until several years later. So I was only partially grown-up. I think that I am still stuck in that partially grown-up stage. I don't think I am totally alone in that.

It is good to grow-up at some point but apparently it is not absolutely necessary. The alternative is that my definitions are a bit off. It could be that growing up is a process not a single point in time when all circumstances converge to affirm relative maturity. I am certain that I have not grown-up. Even my kids will attest to that. I am further along in the process than they are. Really, most of the time I am. I also think that it is not completely necessary or even fun at all to be completely grown-up.

As I have grown older the imaginary age of being grown-up has advanced out a little bit further. First it was 16. Yeah when I am 16, I can drive. That is freedom. Then I'll be grown-up.

Next is 18, certainly 18 is the age. I can vote so I must be grown up.

What about 21? I can legally buy alcohol in most states. Consuming large quantities of it may make you act like anything but a grown-up but if you are so determined to kill yourself you can legally accomplish it, one drink at a time.

25 is the age that I first decided that I am getting to old to be doing something that struck me as being particularly childish. I could also run for Congress if was rich enough or public minded enough to pursue that.

30, now that seems like a good age to determine whether someone is grown up or not. You can run for the Senate, now. I never figured out how if you even were to run at age 25 and be elected to congress, you could not then run for the Senate before you turned 31, not 30. And you have almost no chance or experience of getting elected to the Senate without political experience such as serving in the House of representatives.

Wait now, there is 35! Yes, I could run for President at age 35. That must be when you are certainly an adult and all grown-up.

I am 48. I am still getting there. I have not arrived. I do not want to be all grown up because that seems to have a certain finality about it. It is a morbid appreciation for one's own impending and inevitable doom. Maybe the immaturity expressed in the denial of growing-up is merely rebellion against that realization. Somehow if I admit that I am getting old I may actually have to start acting old. Acting old is something I have seen others do and it always leads to the same outcome that is for me at this moment undesirable.

I worked late today; I got home late. The kids were in bed and Jina is sleeping over. She made me a plate of rice and fish. I hate fish. She knows tha, too but insists on making it for me as it is good for me. At my age I should be eating a lot more fish. She is still trying to force undesirable behaviors upon me, like being healthy. Maybe that is her way of expressing that she still has parts of her that care about me.

One thing, I didn't have to even wonder what's for dinner tonight. I could smell it welcoming me or threatening me as I walked in the door. In the morning, I'll have to remember to thank her for thinking about me. I won't reiterate that I hate fish. It's small but maybe it is a start to thawing things.

E

posted by Unknown @ 11:24 PM