dezoito.

Why do children want to grow up?  Because they experience their lives as constrained by immaturity and perceive adulthood as a condition of greater freedom and opportunity.  But what is there today, in America, that very poor and very rich adolescents want to do but cannot do?  Not much:  they can "do" drugs, "have" sex, "make" babies, and "get" money (from their parents, crime, or the State).  For such adolescents, adulthood becomes synonymous with responsibility rather than liberty.  Is it any surprise that they remain adolescents? 
-Thomas Szasz


legal.

i don't know if perhaps i expected too much (i mean i didn't think i'd get a parade and fireworks) but turning 18 was not very thrilling.
i thought things would be different, i thought my life would make a 180 and change for the better, i thought i'd forget, i thought i'd mature, i thought too much about a double digit number.

sure! there's perks. i can buy ciggs, vote, gamble, go to clubs and hookah bars but is that really it? did i wait all this time to find out that it wasn't a big deal? i wish i could say that turning 18 was a monumental occasion in my life. that being an "adult" was intoxicating and exciting. i wish i could say all those things, instead reality once again slapped me in the face; i've been an adult my whole life.

responsible? yes. outspoken? yes. driven? yes. always talks things out? yes. has to deal with immature youngsters? yes. motherly? sadly, yes. loving? no comment.
see the problem did not lie with my birthday not being a grand celebration, the problem dealt with realizing that i always held the title of "adult" (even if i only was a child). i'd be lying if i said it didn't hurt, at first, to figure out that i never really was a kid. it never dawned on me that i didn't live the life of a kid. it came as instinct to take care of myself, and others, after my father's death and it never bothered me to just stay home and do homework after helping my mother clean. i grew cold to certain spheres in life, cynical in general, and short tempered.

however, i also learned a few good things. how to brush off simple misunderstandings, talk things out with others, take risks, become independent, show compassion and tolerance for others, and plant the seed that would keep me driven to succeed until this very day.

ok, so maybe being an "adult" since i was 8 wasn't such a bad thing. it's true, i didn't get the bells and whistles i hoped for on my 18th birthday but i did get one thing: i found myself. i found a girl who screamed "paradox!" in her being and yet still managed to stay serene and confident.

my life may not be what i expected (shoot, i'm becoming religious if you can believe it!) but it's sure been one hell of an eighteen year long ride.