The older I get, the more I regard my twenties with shame and embarrassment. I know this is not the goal and I actively try to have compassion for the idiot I was, but it’s not easy.
I was entitled, arrogant, defensive, petty, and I didn’t groom my pubic hair. That alone is not really a big deal but the thing is, for whatever reason, I didn’t realize that everyone else was weed wacking.
And for a long time I blamed my mom for not pulling me aside and tipping me off which is very silly since she herself was also au naturale, pubicly-speaking. It’s just a little embarrassing that I wasn’t clued in.
Not clued in is a major theme of that period of time but see, I thought I knew everything. I was so confident in the way I saw things and in my talent.
And I was good at stuff but what I wasn’t good at was understanding anything interpersonal, hearing criticism, and navigating conflict. Both in friendships and in the workplace.
I think I was probably a terrible employee. Or if not terrible, challenging. Disappointing. Hungry for recognition and prestige and willing to work my ass off if it benefitted me personally, but quick to feel resentful if I felt passed over. I had high expectations for the way my big talent was to be handled and regarded.
Maybe that’s not the worst since I think Gen Z is actually being taught to be this way but I find that annoying, just like I find my former self.
(In defense of myself a little: I did work hard and I worked for free for many years. But all that was because I believed it was leading somewhere. It was when I needed to just plug away as an anonymous member of a team that I bristled. Or when I had to suffer fools. I have told the story of a senior editor who was younger than I was, a crime in itself, demanding I produce the answer at 5:30pm on a Friday to the question of how many pounds of heirloom tomatoes New York restaurants go through in a year. I knew, given the 5:30 on Fridayness that this was a fool’s errand and yet my reluctance was seen as obstinance. I’m still annoyed! But I also know, as a boss person now myself, the feeling that I am not paying you to say no. I’m paying you to do what I ask you. He wanted tomato stats. But also he himself wasn’t paying me, he was incrementally higher on the masthead than I was. Anyway two things can be true. 1) There was no Alison in team. 2) this guy sucked.)
Also I drank heavily and made awful desperate decisions where men were concerned.
So it’s just shocking to me that when I reconnect with friends I made during that time of my life I’m struck by how decent they are, both as people and specifically, as friends.
How can this be? I’m tempted to control-alt-delete that whole decade and yet the friends I made before I even gave much thought to being a psychologically healthy person, I still get along with. We share an outlook. How is that, given the fact I barely share an outlook with my old self?
I might think there would be little connective tissue left between someone I was drawn to when I was a ladychild, and yet it turns out I chose friends quite well. Or they chose me well? Regardless I have recently reconnected with a group of college friends and it’s been so wonderful.
And now a story that is going somewhere. I went to a small private K-8 school where I was known as quiet, nice and conscientious. Also as overweight. The summer before I began attending the local public high school I decided, and this is something I literally wrote in my diary, “I would rather be thought of as a bitch than as quiet and nice.”
I intended to pull a Suddenly Susan Desperately Seeking Susan-style makeover on my personality. A complete overhaul. Who is that mysterious bitch, they would all wonder when I sashayed by in my black leggings and oversized Limited mock turtleneck.
But from the outside I was exactly the same. I was still quiet and conscientious.
I am wondering if, from the outside, there is also very little difference between me before I matured and me after. Like the experience inside my body looking out is different but maybe I’m still fundamentally the same person from the outside? Just making healthier decisions and with more of a core?
I don’t know, this is getting very naval gaze-y. Have you also undergone a similar shift?
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So relatable. As a parent of diagnosed neurodivergent kids and the offspring of undiagnosed parents, I wonder how my own brain and perception colored how I entered the world as a young adult. I had such expectations and attitude for days, and me today would have been so irritated by me. But also charmed I hope?
I relate so much to this. My 20s were filled with out of control mental illness (BPD) and so much spazzy behavior. I was attempting to live my best "trad wife" life - stuffing myself into a life that did not fit me, at all. I was recently diagnosed with autism, and that has added so much context to my life. lol. Sometimes its hard not feel the shame and cringe looking back, but it's all part of the dharma.
ps. i love your writing so much.