Ready, and waiting to fall.: Turning 21

“… Time flies when you’re having fun,
You wake up another year is gone,
You’re TWENTY-ONE…”

- “Happy Birthday”, The Click Five

2.17pm tomorrow, somebody’s gonna turn twenty-one. Twenty plus one years old. That’s 662, 256, 000 seconds of breathing and being alive. That’s twenty one years of having the chance to be better and wiser.

The past year has been a blur. What have I achieved so far? What did I do that I can call my 20^th year of life experience worth remembering for the rest of my life?

Let’s see.

Last year this time, I was excited waiting for the family sans the big brother to come to town and celebrate the passing of my teenage glory into the world of two-oh. Excited because I got to see them on my birthday, not because I was getting older. Celebration was simple, but memorable. I had quite yummy dinner with the family in the coffee house of Vistana here. There was no cake, but I had a special ‘compliment from the chef’ birthday nasi goreng Vistana, instead of a birthday cake. And as the ‘present’, I got to order whatever I wanted for dessert. I can’t remember what it was, ‘tho.

After dinner that night, we just sat on the hotel beds doing nothing. The parents kept saying how they couldn’t believe that their baby girl was already turning twenty. The brothers weren’t that gushed and proud that they have a big sister who’s finally one year closer to voting age. The baby girl/big sister was reluctant to turn twenty, but couldn’t wait to turn twenty-one. Turning twenty means you’re no longer a teenager and get to act kiddy, and twenty-one means you’re officially an adult. Well, in this case, an adult in the sense of being responsible for oneself, but still entirely dependent on the parents (financially) and friends (sanity to live in this hell-hole).

So, what do the year between twenty and twenty-one meant to me?

A couple of things happened that made me what I hope a better person. Family, besides friends, is everything you have in this world. When they are all you have, sacrificing your own daily pleasures should come easy, although you would have to endure not-that-painful hardship. It’s like you’re a boarding school student who has a mobile phone in the year 2000. Not having it wouldn’t be that big-a deal, because there’s plenty of public payphones around to call home or to call that snotty ‘other half’. Difficulty of having to let go of something you’re used to have for quite some time should not be incomprehensible at all if loved ones need it more than you do. Sure, the first few weeks is unbearable, but you learn to be okay without it in time.

Material stuff aside, being strong for them is even more important. When push comes to shove, putting on a brave smile and being all sunny and confident that the best is yet to come is better than any sacrifice you have to make, be it your car and with it the freedom to go anywhere you like within driving distance at the drop of a hat, or that care-free money spending up to hundreds of ringgit every month, and this excludes food stuffs. Just the fact that you’re there for them in times of need is enough. A couple of words of encouragement (and probably more) thrown in should make them feel like they have somebody to turn to and it should make you feel better as a human being too.

Many other things happened this past twelve months that I could mention here, but the paragraph above is what I think of as the most important thing I learned, that family is everything.

HERE’S TO A GREAT YEAR OF BEING 21 AND FABULOUS.

What I wished for my 21st birthday, among many other things: