THE MEANING OF LIFE!

"All I can do is read a book to stay awake,
And it rips my life away but it's a great escape."
-Blind Melon, "No Rain"

Emerging from my book at the Atlanta airport, I begin a brief, but thoroughly noble, quest for the bathroom and marvel at how jarring reality can be. There I was in a seething mass of humanity with every individual as complex and wrapped up in their own lives as I am. Trying to fit the enormity of that into my head makes my mind rubbery - it's like trying to contemplate the size of the universe or the number of rogue hairs in an old man's ears. If I was a machine I'm sure I'd be spitting out an infinite loop error; and like a machine the only cure is a couple of quick slaps to the head: RESET! Ah, much better.

Back to the point, though: there are moments in every person's life where they realize how truly small they are. Most of the time we are happy to be the center of our own little world, but when faced with a view of the forest some basic questions begin to bother. How does a person make their one life meaningful when everyone else is out to do the same? And who does it have to be meaningful to? Will you be remembered as the person who lived a "full life" and spat out a bunch of babies? The inventor? The philanthropist? The villain? Or, even worse: not remembered at all? The fact we all have to resign ourselves to is that we will die and be forgotten. No one lives forever, neither in memory nor in body, and that's the truth of it. The seasons still pass and the sun will shine on - so what do we do while it happens to be shining on us?

Life in a story is a lie! It's too perfectly encapsulated and purposeful; which is very likely the appeal of them in the first place. So much of life feels like preparation for the big show. The classes and savings, in my mind, are but a groundwork for some untold adventure hidden in the murky future. The problem of life? It has no plot!

Why the Crisis?

Ah, quarter-life crisis! While it seems absolutely ridiculous for a person in their mid-20's to be obsessing about their age, we all go through it in our own fashion. Some boys and girls turn to casual sex, drugs, compensatory cars...while others turn introspective and philosophical while still honing their neuroses to a fine point. (The better to stab at other minds with!) Why does this happen? Well! It's the loss of training wheels, in my opinion.

Think about it. For the first 18-22 years of life we're set on a pretty rigid track; school and recreational activities give our lives structure while we're still shielded from reality by parents or academia. The first couple years of "real world" experience can be jarring and exhilarating. Free! Free at last! Free to stay up late, make mistakes, pay bills...all the good things. And for a couple years we roll in that freedom like happy puppies do on interesting smells. But we've still been trained to look for our track. Where is it? What's the next step? The problem is that the mid-20's is when we've reached the "under-construction" end of the line and it's our turn to drive some spikes. Now that we're looking for structure we have two options: 1) be original and set a unique life course, or 2) connect to the old rail-way with stop-overs in marriage and baby town.

So that's why my 20-something girlfriends look at babies and imagine their own uterus walking around on crutches; or why at weddings the bridesmaids smile in that wooden, should-have-been-me way. They're feeling the pressure of having a life without direction. It's time to figure things out! The quarter-life crisis mirrors the mid-life in many ways and I think the reasons are the same. While the mid-lifers have reached the end of the baby-line, the quarter-lifers are toeing it cautiously.

So that's what this blog is dedicated to: exploring the quarter-life crisis. If you've got any stories, I'd love to hear them. And remember, it's not actually a quarter-life crisis, because chances are we won't live that long!