Playing Grown Ups

Years ago, but it seems like yesterday, I discovered a pink razor in my parents bathroom and decided to shave my legs and arms. As well as that disastrous event, I would occasionally creep over to my Dad's chest of drawers and cause my armpits to violently sting by spraying myself with his Right Guard. It also doesn't seem that long since I covered my entire body, and my faithful doll Paula, in my mother's Lancome red lipstick. I was only doing what (I thought) I was seeing my parents do as part of their daily routines. Now, in a month's time, I have to get my shit together and stop playing at grown ups, because I'm GRADUATING and am about to join them in the ranks of adulthood for real.
That big, giant, scary word is now being flung around in conversation far too casually by people whose lives post-university are arrogantly sorted out or taken care of. But, perhaps more commonly, it is being muttered under short nervous breaths in conjunction with jittery eyes that look to the sky like an awkward man pretending he hasn't noticed a big pair of breasts in front of him. Our English Facebook thread on the topic of where to take our parents for lunch after our gown ceremony (jokes, they'll be paying since we'll all be broke) is entitled 'Graduation - Lol'. Even more taboo is the word JOB. I tend to find that the only people who ask whether you have a job lined up are either my parent's friends and acquaintances or other undergrads who do have a job waiting for them and like to bandy it around for all to see. Everyone else seems content to avoid the topic altogether, or ask what your 'plans' are from June onwards, a far vaguer term which, usually, happily steers the topic of conversation on to Summer holidays and which niche festival you'll be attending. 

I am hurtling towards graduation without my life being in order in any way, shape or form. I keep telling people I'd like to go into 'fashion marketing or editorial', which is true, but I'm not really 'going' anywhere at the moment. I argue consistently that the pressure of knowing and finding exactly what you want to do is almost impossible to cope with at the same time as trying to get a decent degree. I think in many ways university has taught me independence and time management, but it's also made me unable to rise before 9am or to focus my mind on more than one thing at a time, be it an essay or an episode of Girls. That's even when I've done more extra curricular stuff than other students would bother with. The other day over Sunday lunch, when my brother declared he was thinking about drama school, my mother deploringly asked us if at least one child could please be a lawyer, doctor or accountant. Nice, sensible jobs but I'm afraid mother dearest, not suitable for any of your frightfully creative and dysfunctional offspring. 

Whether I have a job or not, come June 3rd when I walk out of my final final, I will probably have to start acting like a grown up sharpish. I think in your final year at university they should offer transitional etiquette classes and not just CV-writing assistance. As I hound fashion companies for internships I will wave goodbye to my student discount (I weep), I will lose my loan (and begin debt) and, at least for a little while, will likely become another waitress who you'd never guess had a 2:1 in English Literature. But I just don't feel grown up and I'm still eating raisins from those miniature SunMaiden cardboard boxes for heaven's sake. The only sign that I am anywhere near ready for adulthood is that I sometimes write in my Filofax and now enjoy receiving scented candles and nice soap as gifts. 

There is some hope; I recently did an online test that told me I had the mental age of thirty-three. However, that I thoroughly enjoyed partaking in this bout of cyber-psychometrics, clearly compiled of utter b*****ks including the question 'were you a teacher's pet', is somewhat childish, wouldn't you say?