21 Things that will (probably) happen to you in your 20s
Earlier, I shared a list of things that will (probably) happen to you in your 30s. Although I'm over eight years past my 20s, I still actually remember much of it, and as a relationship advice columnist, I get letters every day from people in their 20s who remind me why I'm happy to have moved on from what I call that "decade of decadence and despair." Here are 21 things you can expect to (probably) happen in your 20s.
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Earlier, I shared a list of things that will (probably) happen to you in your 30s. Although I'm over eight years past my 20s, I still actually remember much of it, and as a relationship advice columnist, I get letters every day from people in their 20s who remind me why I'm happy to have moved on from what I call that "decade of decadence and despair." Here are 21 things you can expect to (probably) happen in your 20s.
1. You'll date someone who has "been through some stuff" and will "need space" to "get their head together" before they can "get serious about anyone."
2. Which is basically code for: "I just want to sleep with you, not go to your family's house for Thanksgiving, kay, thanks."
3. You'll have approximately three to seven weddings a year you have to buy gifts for and maybe find dates for and get time off from work to go to.
4. But, hey, that's three to seven open bars, and three to seven opportunities to wear a cute dress and meet someone who already has "their head together."
5. Plus, if it's a family wedding, maybe Mom and Dad will pay for your plane ticket.
6. Which would be awesome, because the last time you checked, you had, like, $14.37 in your checking account.
7. Which is how much you have left in your account every month after you pay rent and cable and buy groceries and pay your student loan bill (ugh, student loan bill!).
8. If you're a straight woman, you will, at some point (and probably more than once), Google: "Am I pregnant?"
9. You will also, at some point (and probably more than once), Google: "Quarterlife Crisis" and "I hate my job" just to see what kind of advice Google has for you.
10. Because you will, at some point, hate your job. And so will many, if not most, of your friends.
11. And making $33,000 a year "with benefits" just isn't as awesome as you thought it was going to be when you took this job a year and a half out of college when you were just happy to have a job, let alone one with health insurance and vacation days.
12. And it's not even so much the job that sucks -- even though it totally does -- it's the whole soul-sucking career. It's just not what you want to be doing for the rest of your life. Or even for the rest of the year. You want to be doing something completely different, out of the corporate world. Something meaningful.
13. So you'll think about going to grad school (and maybe you even will) or joining AmeriCorps or spending a year working on your preferred candidate's presidential campaign.
14. This new focus in your life will totally help heal the broken heart you're still nursing which hurts so bad and so deep, you'll wonder how the millions of people who have suffered broken hearts before you managed to move on, let alone go to work and, like, eat food and go to the grocery store and stuff.
15. They probably just didn't hurt as much as you do, maybe because no one has ever loved and lost as hard as you have.
16. And maybe that relationship was it for you -- your best chance at something realand now it's gone, and you're totally going to be alone and single when you turn 30.
17. And you know what? Screw it. If you're going to be alone and single when you turn 30, you're at least going to look amazing. So you start taking Soul Cycle classes and you get obsessed, and you do this juice cleanse your friend did right before her wedding and you buy a new dress that totally shows off how amazing your legs look and you throw a big party where you actually supply some of the booze -- because,hello! 30! -- and if you're not going to have a wedding, you're at least going to have a kicka** birthday party with an open(ish) bar.
18. And so many people come from all these different worlds you have -- friends from grad school or AmeriCorps, the presidential campaign you worked on, and friends from that job had and hated, and a couple Tumblr friends, and your Soul Cycle girls, and your former college roommate, and your old neighbors, and your two friends you haven't seen in months because they had babies and now they never leave their house, but they're out now, for you. Everyone's out for you!
19. And you'll be like, damn, my 20s kind of sucked, but they were kind of awesome, too. And now they're over and I'm OLD.
20. But then some of your friends who are a few years older will hug you so tight and say, "You're going to LOVE your 30s! They're amazing."
21. And maybe it's the third cocktail you're drinking on the heels of two back-to-back Soul Cycle classes and the juice cleanse you did earlier in the week that's making you a little delirious, but you actually believe them, and two hours into your 30s, you raise your cocktail in the air and say, "You're right! This IS amazing!" (And it is... at least until then hangover the next morning).