On Growing Up... or Not.

So yesterday night a friend asked me why I never updated my Xanga anymore and I had to really sit down and think about the answer. I remember how proud I was on the day my Xanga became 1,000 days old back in sophomore year of high school. Back then, Xanga was "the thing to have." Everyone felt the need to post every little thing that happened to them that day and I was no exception. Ultimately, I think the reason why I stopped posting was because I felt confined by it in some sense. My life became defined by what everyone else wrote in their Xanga entries and I tried to conform. The last entry I wrote was on December 31, 2007 and it ended with:

"With next year comes many new things: first time going to college, first (and hopefully only) time graduating from high school, first time having to move to a new house (well, I moved from Dallas but I don't remember that at all), and I'm sure many more.
It's weird reading over old xanga entries from 7th grade and see how my priorities and other things in my life have changed. I guess this is what growing up is? The loss of innocence, the loss of the unknown... perhaps gaining the desire to explore more."

That last line reminds me of a poem my friend once pasted to me:
People always say to me
"What do you think you'd like to be
When you grow up?"
And I say, "Why,
I think I'd like to be the sky
Or be a plane or train or mouse
Or maybe a haunted house
Or something furry, rough and wild...
Or maybe I will stay a child."

Lately my parents have been pestering me about what I want to do when I grow up. They ask me questions like, "who do you want to be?", "what do you want to do with your life?", "how are you going to support yourself?" Although I frequently press the conveniently located "ignore" button to avoid such calls, I can't help but wonder about the future sometimes. It's weird to think of myself as "old" now. When I was little, I thought I had the world at my fingertips. At least that's what everyone always told me. But now that world seems to be growing rapidly smaller and I'm not sure I'm ready for it. I still find myself slipping and saying things like "when I grow up..." and my parents rush to correct me by saying, "you're already grown up." It's a scary concept, really.

I'm working to revise my job resumé right now and I can't help but wonder what all these titles mean. AP scholar with distinction, FEIB intern, neuroscience lab intern, ISRC president... in the end, aren't they all just titles? Someone could have the most amazing experience of their lives that would help them at any job, but they would only be able to write a couple of Times New Roman, font 12 words on a white sheet of paper (that is, unless they pulled an Elle Woods). It just seems illogical to me.