still a kid

Was browsing through some decade old photographs when all of the sudden it popped into my head, completely uninvited, a weird little moment-memory (momery?)of my eldest aunt on my father's side telling me during CNY, hai2 mei2 you3 jie2 huen1,
jiu4 shi4 xiao3 hai2 ma3(loosely translated as, if you're not married yet, you're still a (small) kid).

As my jaw dropped in indignation, my dad, perhaps knowing me a little too well (and more likely to save us all the embarassing spectacle of me attempting to foist my
21st century opinions upon my aunt in Chinese), smoothly entered the conversation, changed the topic, and told me to go off elsewhere and run some random errands.

It's funny. I think I remember writing it sometime ago. You attend more and more weddings, and you get that icky feeling that you're still a child, while all your friends have gone off, gotten themselves hitched, and (gasp) somehow managed to become adults.

I'm thinking about how I see myself, at this ripe old age, neither as a child nor an
adult (and not a teenager either). Although I do get that adult-y feeling every once in awhile whenever some kid refers to me as "auntie", or when I'm talking to someone a decade or so younger than me, and it occurs to me that they see me, for some unknown reason, as an adult.

In this moment of identity-ageist crisis, I suddenly wonder how many of my friends actually identify as adults, and how many of you don't know, and how many still think of themselves as nothing more than some big kid?

What's adulthood? Is it moving out from under my parents' roof? Is it being financially independent? Is it having a job, having a car, having a spouse, having a kid, having both parents deceased, what?

Do you think you're an adult? Those of you who are married, do you think you're an adult? Were you an adult before or after you got married? If it was before, what made you an adult? And those who aren't married but think you're an adult, what makes you an adult?

Why is adult the root word of adultery?


*Pardon for all the ranting..just a gentle reminder; I have received feedbacks that this blog kinda cluttered. Personal entries lumping with commercial postings, well, not to worry. All the "personal" entries will be transfered to another sub-section in times to come. Thank you for your kind understanding and patience. *wink*

Posted by R