the 27 club! (but not that one)
Hello, everyone — welcome to the 27 Club!!! Now that I’m here, we’re all here. In the 27 Club, we are #strongertogether. The 27 Club is a beautiful place, full of laughter and love and kindness and people who just feel alive and ready for wherever the world is gonna take them!
Wait, that’s not what the 27 Club is? Oh, it’s actually the complete opposite? Oh, so everyone in this club is dead? And you’re saying this is a club I don’t want to be involved in? Okay, so that’s actually not the one I was talking about. I was talking about …
THE LATE TWENTIES CLUB
Look at us! We’re all here! We’re in our late 20s! We’re getting old! We’re so old! Couldn’t be older (if you’re in the 27 Club am I right)! What the hell happens next! What are we supposed to do now! I haven’t a single thought in my mind about what the future holds.
I think I’ve mentioned this in the past, but it’s impossible for me to imagine my future. I can’t even picture what tomorrow will be like. Every time I close my eyes to picture it, it looks like everything has been fast-forwarded, and I can’t catch up. Even if you tell me what we’re doing on Wednesday, I won’t believe it until it happens. I didn’t even know I was gonna be 27. I knew it was supposed to happen, but it wasn’t something I could picture. And now I am, unless I’m not and my parents have been lying to me this whole time … wait. No, haha. No way. Haha.
Here’s a picture of me from turning 27 the other day:
AND YOU KNOW WHAT — maybe I’m kidding, but there is literally no difference from then to now in how I look, as well as my height. I’m the same height. Is that smile not the same as this smile from last month?
Like, can a girl learn to close her damn mouth? The bats are about to fly right in!
Not much has changed. I still smile with my mouth open. I still don’t drink enough water. The only differences are that I now have my own credit cards and my own apartment and a full-time job and write a newsletter and have a gym membership and get invited to weddings and vote in elections which I will be doing on Friday and put hot sauce on everything and pay my own phone bill and get yelled at by my landlord all the time and know how to dice an onion and wait sriracha costs ELEVEN DOLLARS now???? like what is going onnnnn almost nothing has changed except for these things.
But a lot of the things that haven’t changed are good. I wake up every day. I laugh every day. I still can’t picture what’s next. I still get light-headed when I get up too quickly. I send memes in the group chat. I receive memes in the group chat. I drop my phone every day. Every. single. day. I get distracted every day. I unclench my jaw every day. I play an instrument. I go outside. I appreciate my life every day.
It’s so important to appreciate life. The things we read and see are so upsetting, and we have to figure out how to help and handle them while still helping ourselves. We have to spread the word about Palestine and continue to fight with our families about how there is no good U.S. presidential candidate. We have to learn how to communicate with our friends about everything as we continue to grow older. We all turn 27 and keep changing. The world keeps changing, so it’d be so weird and uncomfortable if we weren’t changing with it. We don’t have to have big birthday parties, but we do need to celebrate. If you’re a Jehovah’s Witness and you’re reading this, no you aren’t.
We need to keep reading and learning and laughing and arguing and researching Scientology and drinking enough water so that we can continue to argue without getting a headache. And while I don’t know what this year holds for me or anyone else, I know that I made it here and will make it tomorrow and the next day and the next week and the next month and the next year and then we’ll be right back to another birthday episode of Circle Back. Hopefully, next year, I have already gained the courage to add a paid subscriber version of this, though … you saw all the differences in my life; I’ve got Bills To Pay, readers!
I hope you all celebrated my birthday well this past week. I know we all felt the Spring Equinox vibes, which means the end of the Pisces season. Do with that what you will.
movie rec: since it was my birthday, it has to be my go-to — Sister Act
book rec: just discovered that my grandmother’s favorite author was Philip Roth, so I’m beginning my journey with his work
music rec: Sam Evian’s new record Plunge it is So Good ™
c u next week