The other night I used a feature on my phone that I completely forgot about: the voice memo. Remember when all we had were dumbphones and we would consecrate 50 seconds of a B2K concert on a voice memo, never ever to be deleted!? Yes, well that was the last time I used a voice memo.

But, the other night I was driving and, per usual, playing a mental game of ping pong with my dating life as the little plastic white ball up for smacking. Then, a few ideas came to me and I just sort of mumbled through them on a voice memo so I wouldn’t forget my post midnight profoundness.

“I feel like I’ve conjured up this idea in my head that people who are in relationships are somehow more adult or somehow more put together…as though they’ve figured out some shit that the rest of us are trying to figure out…I’ve realized now that’s not it at all.”

That’s how the voice memo started.

I’m always evaluating and re-evaluating and crowdsourcing when it comes to Tyece’s Theories on Dating and Relationships. And, the other night, I finally reached a point where I shrugged my shoulders and decided maybe, just maybe, it’s time for me to take a chill pill.

After being laid back on a slingshot and fired in to the unforgiving world of adulthood, I wrongly assumed that being an adult was some prescriptive package. Stable job. Decent place to live. Cool hobbies. Vibrant social life. Secure and consistent monogamous relationship. And, perhaps that is what we all aim for. But, we certainly do not all get it at the same time or in the same way.

In my quest to become the automaton version of a grown up, I convinced myself that it was time to stop being a fucktard when it came to dating. It was time to only go on serious dinner and drinks dates. I convinced myself of some twisted single girl theories and spent way too many nights writing about my life instead of going out and actually living it.

But, now, I’m starting to realize that is not adulthood at all. Adulthood is owning your choices and their subsequent consequences. It’s living your life. It’s sometimes shutting your mouth and not giving everyone access to graffiti your existence with their opinions. And it’s being a decent, kind, fully functioning individual among all of that.

I started to recognize something even more important. Twenty-three years old is just as adult as PlayDoh is edible. I can fake it between the hours of 8:30-5:30 and hide behind my brightly knit cardigan, but I am still a youngin. I am still allowed to screw up and make mistakes. We all are. And we all will. We won’t plunge ourselves in to a never-ending pit of self-destruction if we get completely twisted one night or quit our job or make out with a stranger. In fact, maybe it’s through those things that we will finally come in to our true adult selves. Pat Benatar said, We are young. Heartache to heartache we stand. No promises, no demands.

 And, obviously, Pat Benatar is a god among men. Obviously.

Back to Saturday night’s voice memo: people in relationships are no more or no less than the rest of us mere mortals. In one of my favorite lists of all times, 11 Things to Know At 25 (ish), it says all of our choices are half chance. We do not become adults by being in relationships or having great jobs or any of the other lies we like to tell ourselves. We become adults by owning our choices and their subsequent consequences.

Until then, I’ll enjoy being young.

Xoxo,

Tyece