Everyone wants to be older, no one wants to get old.

This was originally a topic assigned to me as homework in my german class to prep for a test. Well, I loved the topic so much that I've decided to share my opinions with you.

When you were a kid, didn't you always look at the older kids and go green with envy at all the cool things they could do? In Kindergarten, all you could do was paste macaroni onto a piece of paper and call it art while those 5th graders across the hall got to make ceramic bowls. In 6th grade you were taking Math while the 8th graders were taking Pre-Algebra and complaining about how hard it was to multiply fractions, while you were still learning what 'to the power of...' meant. When you were 17 and in your Junior year, you envied those Seniors so much, because they were graduating and being welcomed into the real world. You wanted to be older, admit it.

But once you actually hit your 'target age', whether it was 10, 18 or 21, you started to look back and wish you were a kid again, when everything was simpler. When a fight at school usually involved 10 minutes in the corner as opposed to 2 hours in the Detention room after school and a call home. When there was nap time and your mother made you lunch every day and no one could make fun of you because they all had the same. When it was cool to have a lunchbox with your favorite superhero on it and you had a cubby with your name above it.

You start to think about how you always wished you were older and what it was like to actually be older. You remember thinking it was so great to be thirteen, a real teenager, not a pre-teen anymore. You remember your sweet sixteen and how you felt so cool because you only had 2 more years until you were a legal adult, and only 5 until you could drink. If you had an older sibling, you remember resenting them for being older and knowing more and being able to do more things than you could. If they were younger, you remember being jealous that they could get away with everything and could still pull off the sweet, innocent look. You also remember thinking, cynically, perhaps, that you would enjoy it when they couldn't use that look anymore.

You might also remember that sometimes it felt like the older you got, the less it mattered. After all, once you reached 30, age didn't matter any more. 29 was still desirable, but 30 was horrible-and 31 was even worse. Maybe it felt like you wouldn't be as fun and spunky and happy as you were in your twenties. But that really depended on the person. You could look at other people and say, 'I bet they'd be the perfect 30 year old...' Ever seen '13 Going On 30'? Think of that.

But not only was being older depressing because you couldn't act like a kid anymore, but because you couldn't look like a kid anymore, either. You didn't look young, most people could probably guess your age if they looked hard enough and you were starting to get pains in your body that you'd never had before. And you were also probably paying a lot more attention to the televangelists when they talked about thier miracle cellucite stopping products or weightloss programs...Don't deny it, no one will think less of you.

But being old didn't always have a bad side. Maybe becoming a parent or a respected person in your line of work, that's something you could definitely not do as a kid. Finding that 'special someone' wasn't necessarily top priority anymore, but it was still in the top 5 and you could drink, which is always a plus. You could drive, see R rated movies, buy alcohol and get as many tattoos as you wanted-it didn't matter, it was your life and no one could stop you from living it.

You developed a political opinion and were able to vote, you watched the news and enjoyed it, you drank that coffee in the morning, just for an extra pick-me-up. You were able to stay up later and later, talking with people and complaining about taxes and bills and your job and the children acorss the street from you.

Ask yourself the question: Was growing up exactly what you expected it to be? Was it better? Was it worse? It can be anything, really, if you think about it. At some times, it can be absolutely amazing and at others, you wish you would've stayed in bed sick for the rest of your life. It makes no sense to evaluate your life and criticize it, because you can't change it. You've done what you've done and you can't go back...unless someone invents a time machine. Make your decisions in the wisest way possible and you might be able to have a halfway decent life. No one can tell you which road to take, but that doesn't mean they can't hope you'll take the one less chosen. But if everyone takes the path less chosen, wouldn't the other path look newer?

--Cassy [Being 16 is fuuuuuun]