Oh, you foolish Alice!

In Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, the Victorian-era Alice is plunged into a metaphorical world of fantastical creatures and adventures, where she learns quickly to expect nothing more than the proverbial unexpected.  Rather than being surprised in her encounters, she waffles between mild bewilderment and nostalgia for her life outside the rabbit hole.  She is clearly a child, quoting nursery rhymes and fairy tales, but she implies she has moved on from such childish ways.  Her true, child-like perception of her world is made apparent after she drinks from the bottle and grows to an unexpectedly enormous size. 

        "When I used to read fairy-tales, I fancied that kind of thing never happened, and now here I am in the middle of one! There ought to be a book written about me, that there ought! And when I grow up, I'll write one--but I'm grown up now," she added in a sorrowful tone; "at least there's no room to grow up any more HERE."

Alice has always viewed the world by looking up.  Suddenly she is at the top and is able to see everything around her, but at what price?

            "But then," thought Alice, "shall I NEVER get any older than I am now? That'll be a comfort,  one way--never to be an old woman- -but then--always to have lessons to learn! Oh, I shouldn't like THAT!"

            "Oh, you foolish Alice!" she answered herself.  "How can you learn lessons in here? Why, there's hardly room for YOU, and no room at all for any lesson-books!"

I get where she's coming from.  I'm a big, tall Amazonian girl who towered over most people, including my entire family, by the age of twelve.  Like Alice, I was precocious and educated.  But no matter how old my brain thought it was, how grown up it was, I was still a little girl. 

The idea that Alice seems to latch onto is that there's nothing else to learn--no more room to grow--once you're grown.  Is that the ultimate definition of an adult, a person who is fully grown to complete capacity and can learn no more?  If so, I'll borrow a line from another fictional, petulant child: "I'll never grow up, never grow up, never grow up! Not me!"

Even at the age of 38, I have been accused of behaving childishly, usually like a teenager on a rebellious quest.  So what?  I throw an occasional tantrum.  I regularly dye my hair purple (or pink or blue), just in time for parent-teacher conferences at my sons' school.  I still hate to wear shoes, and I still get a thrill out of sneaking around the house at night when no one else is awake. 

Again I say, so what? 

The difference at 38 instead of 18 is that I have seen and experienced much, much more in the expanse of my lifetime.  I have lived through true heartache and trauma, experienced life and death in the most profound ways, and I have seen the best and worst of myself through all of it.  I may still be idealistic from time to time in what I believe the preferable course for my life may be, but my idealism is tempered with a bit of pragmatism and common sense.

I have paid my dues and done my time, and I am wizened enough now to make those choices for myself.  I'm not rebelling against anything or anyone; I'm rebelling for myself.  I am actively choosing to behave in whatever way I find suits my prerogative.

Honestly, getting old scares the hell out of me.  I don't relish the thought of wrinkles and sagging and realizing my life is drawing to a close, but I accept that those things will eventually happen.  While they may be inevitable, I will not accept that they are imminent.  38 seemed impossibly old when I was 18.  Now it often seems as if life is really just beginning. 

When I turned 30, I was bombarded with emails from people offering me sympathy.  Surely I must be sad to be hitting that milestone!  Guess what?  I was happy!  I didn't even have to pretend to give a shit what other people thought any more.  I celebrated by dying my hair blue, then purple, then taking my toddler son to Gymboree class. 

40 is coming soon enough.  Prepare yourselves now. 

I can remember thinking like Alice, thinking how wonderful it would be to be a grown-up, to have all that insipid growing behind you.  As an adult, I would have the world at my fingertips; everything would be exactly as I wanted it to be.

Instead what I found was that being an adult is just damn hard.  The responsibility is enormous at times, but the rewards can be just as staggering.  I find I'm a little less overwhelmed by it all if I take the time to hang off the sofa upside down, eat Lucky Charms for dinner, or even throw a little tantrum when things aren't just right on my side of the rabbit hole.

Like Alice, sometimes I think maybe there ought to be a book written about me.  Who knows?  Maybe I'll write one... when I grow up. 

Comments

[Al Haughton]

Staphanie, I have just come acros you quite by accident in Facebook. Having read this first piece I SOOOO agree with your outlook. I'm 48, nearly 49, working man and family man, but a howling mad rock and roller at the weekend. I dy what's left of my hair blonde... Why..? Just because I can... I look forward to the rest of you written words in here with glee...

[StephQJ]

Thank you so much for stopping by! I hope you enjoy what you find here, and I definitely recommend you check out my true groupie love, The Gracious Few. They're headed to Europe in a few weeks, and it is a balls-to-the-walls rock show!