actually, i totally embrace my inner adolescent, and i usually regret it after i can tell i hurt somebody’s feelings with a sarcastic comment that crosses my lips before i think about it. i also think there is more evidence that other people do too than we like to admit. i mean, why else would every woman be wearing those hideous “gaucho” shorts that look horrific on everyone?

i think the reason adolescentlike doesn’t exist is that it’s messy, and that we don’t ever grow out of it, we just learn to control it. “growing up” = getting a filter. it’s like being a recovering alcoholic. adolescence is still there in our hearts; we just don’t act it out everyday.

the problem is, as you pointed out, my dear chutney, there are parts of adolescence that are gloriously beautiful: the overactive sense of justice, the note-passing, the sense that everything is the worst thing that ever happened to anybody ever. the protest dances.

hi, my name is 4alarm, and i’m a recovering adolescent.

Perhaps the problem is not just that we’re embarassed, but also that some of us don’t particularly like who we were then. I know that I regret some of the things I said and did and how I treated other people. Then, too, there were the 7:30 AM classes, the acne, the Algebra II. Definitely some things I’d like to block out. And I’d take the ignorant self-confidence of 10 or the slightly more seasoned self-confidence of 30 over the confusion of 12-25 any day.

Then again, there’s something to be said for the liminal experience. I just wish it weren’t so protracted.