Single White Unemployed Female: Being a Grown-Up Still Means You can Keep Your Childhood

It’s Valentine’s Day this Sunday, and I’m probably going to send Hannah Montana valentines to my friends, or something else just as ridiculous. I usually go to Target and look for the most obnoxious valentines made this year, usually something Disney or Nickelodeon, to give out to people.

Why? Because simple childhood pleasures, like these valentines, are cool again in college.

During exam week, there’s the Stress-Free Zone in the Great Hall where you can make splatter paint Frisbees, sand art and other projects that you used to get in a kit from Zany Brainy back in the day (greatest store ever). On Devil-Goat Day, you get to jump on moon bounces and eat cotton candy. Just this weekend, people were out frolicking in the snow, building snowmen and sledding down hills.

It wasn’t like this in high school. In fact, it was the total opposite. A lot of my good friends were a year older than me, and when they graduated, I wished I was getting out, too. They came back during breaks, and when we hung out at the mall, they would discuss whether Natty Light or Keystone was the crappier cheap beer.
I wanted to be them, going to college parties and being able to take classes in things I liked (little did I know I still had to take science and math in college).

When I got to college, it was like being a kid again. My friends and I would buy cartoon-themed school supplies and watch Disney movies in each other’s dorm rooms. Since my freshman year, some of my Mason hallmates and I get together each October to watch the cinematic classic Hocus Pocus.

So why is it, that after spending so many years as teenagers trying to prove to the world that we were cool and mature, we resort to things someone half our age or younger would enjoy doing?

I guess since we’ve finally been granted the freedom we struggled to get in high school, we’ve seen that while it’s fun to not have someone telling you what time you have to be back, it also comes with consequences.

You can skip a class and not necessarily be penalized for it, but you’re going to miss a ton of material. In high school, skipping could get you detention, but it wouldn’t cost you when it came to the final.

When I graduate in May, I’ll definitely be growing up, but growing up doesn’t mean you have to give up everything immature and childish. Continue to play board games and eat raw cookie dough. It’s okay to still be a kid at heart, even if you’re a CEO. When there’s pressure and stress in life, you’ll need it.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m think I’m going to go take a nap.