Cyclical

I’m stealing this idea from my friend Eric.

I turn 31 next Sunday. Saying this is not where I expected to be at this age is possibly the understatement of the century, but this is going to be an exercise in vanity that enables me to look back at where I’ve been and what I’ve done.

21

I turned 21 at home in North Carolina, about a week after transferring from Iceland. Since the hottest it ever gets in Iceland was about 60, the heat and humidity of a NC summer was nearly unbearable.

I was home in between duty stations, preparing to change Navy jobs, from lithographer to journalist. I didn’t think about it, but I think that at that point I was still considering a career in the Navy as a viable option. I liked the money and the freedom, and even though I had the usual authority problems, they didn’t seem as pressing while I was on leave.

During that leave period I bought my first (and only) car, a Saturn SL1. I wanted a blue car, but they only had silver on the lot, and I was impatient enough to settle. Saturn took pictures of all the new cars they sold, and I was excited enough about picking it up that I dressed up in my favorite navy blue silk blouse and khaki pants. I still have that picture somewhere, and it never fails to make me smile; only I am enough of a geek to dress up to pick up my new car. I had managed to save $10,000 from working a couple part-time jobs in Kef, and I was mostly proud that I had set up a loan through my bank and didn’t have to deal with the dealer people. I took my parents with me as I went from dealership to dealership because my stepmother was a master haggler, and I remember being really embarrassed when she tried to argue with the Saturn people about the price of my car. I really liked the car I chose, but I mostly went with Saturn because the salespeople actually treated me like an adult. The salesmen at the other dealerships treated me like a little girl whose daddy was spoiling her.

I also bought my first new computer that visit, a Dell tower that I ended up loathing. That computer turned me into an Apple person.

I realize I haven’t actually talked about my birthday yet. I don’t remember much, except that my friend Evan, who I had had a crush on since high school, kissed me. I think I knew that it wasn’t anything, he might even have felt obligated to do it in a way, but it made me feel special and wanted, even if only for that minute.

The drinking age in Iceland was 20, so that birthday is nothing but a haze of drunken impressions. As a result, I didn’t feel the need for 21 to be celebrated in a club, with yet another liquor-induced haze. My friends and I sat in the backyard of my parent’s house and drank, and when I got drunk enough, we wandered through the tiny backstreets of Mt. Pleasant. We never had to worry that we would get run over, even when sitting in the middle of Highway 49 at 3 a.m., laughing and telling absolutely ridiculous jokes and stories. I think this might have been the last time I felt really close with my friends from high school; after I moved to Illinois we gradually grew further and further apart, and now I catch up with them via Facebook status updates and the occasional awkward visit when I go home.

The events surrounding my 21st birthday have had a tremendous influence on my life. When my leave ended I went to Ft. Meade, Maryland, to the Defense Information School (DINFOS). I discovered journalism while I was attempting to escape a shitty boss and a boring life in Keflavik, but I discovered I was good at it while I was at DINFOS. If I hadn’t campaigned so hard to cross-rate, I would have been preparing to get out of the Navy right after my 22nd birthday. I would not have been stationed in Great Lakes. I would not have met Peter. I would not have gone to Columbia College. I would not have studied journalism. I don’t know where I would be right now had I not made that decision, and I sometimes wonder, but most of the time I try not to think about the peculiar forks my life has taken.