Freaked!

You know one day when you just wake up and realise that things aren't the same? Yesterday, I freaked out. I woke up and realised that in a week, I would be 27 years old. TWENTY SEVEN YEARS OLD. I would have been on this planet, leading this life for 27 years. What do I have to show for that? What have I learned? I look at people around me, younger than me, who know who they are, what they're doing, where they're going. I hugged my monkey closer, realising that people 10 years younger than me had written books, founded and sold companies, had record deals, careers and I was staring at my ceiling in the dark, listening to my heart thud loudly.

When I was younger, 27 year olds had their shit figured out. They didn't call it shit because they knew what it freaking was. I don't even know that! My friends my age are either married, getting engaged or even having babies. I know that it's not the be all and end all to get married and pop tiny humans out of you, but they know what their lives are!!! People who have high powered careers, they know what direction their life is going. People my age are singers, actors, painters, lawyers, doctors - they have definition. I have a friend Darren, who did his MBA and is now exploring the world of sound engineering. He has a life path AND a back up option and he is only 23. Sheesh.

People ask me "what do you do?" I say I work at so and so place, but that's it. That is what I do??? What happened to the dreamer that I was? How do I explain what happened to me to the 16 year old me? That in the last ten years, I've basically amounted to no great accomplishments. My name is not carved anywhere, that I'm merely one of the many average sheep, nothing distinguishing me from anyone apart from my name, which I didn't even come up with! I still haven't got it sorted. I don't know what my life is, if I'll have the great, amazing career, if I'll have a zillion kids (read cats and dogs) and chill with them, if I'll travel, if I'll ever find someone to share my life with (read a human). At 27, don't you have to have it all figured out? My mum knew what she was at 27, she was a mother with a career. She knew what she wanted from life.

I don't know if I want a house in the countryside or an apartment in the heart of the city, I don't know if I want to stay in India or move (or with the visa headaches, if I even CAN move), I don't know if I want the career I have now to last me till I retire or if I want to switch, I don't know if I want to continue writing, am I even skilled at this? When people ask me about my skills, I say I can write. Every literate person can write. What does that even mean? What can I write? Can you call writing a talent? Then shouldn't walking be a talent? Maybe next time I can say I can walk when people as me what my skills are! I can't sing, can't dance, can't paint. What can I offer this world? How do I make my mother proud of me? She's been through so much for me, and if she can't say "That's my kid" when I accomplish something, what was the point? I can eat my weight in sugar. That can be my accomplishment. Maybe. I need to figure out something awesome and go do it. Pronto.

It's so weird to think that at 16, I was so much more secure about who I was, what I wanted to do and where I wanted to go. Granted it was a pipe dream and quite unrealistic, but I still had some direction. Today, I go to work, I come home to my cat, I meet friends sometimes and I hang with the family on the weekends. This is my life. This is what 10 years of pipe dreams have amounted to. It's like I've become content, content with not knowing, living in the present, feeling happy in the moment. I know it could be a lot worse, but I can't help but feel disappointed in myself that I didn't live up to those grand visions I had ten years ago, that my life is based on contentedness and not vision, drive and chasing the unreal.

I guess I've calmed down while writing this, and I know I don't have any regrets, I wouldn't change the decisions I've taken, but sometimes, I do wish I had done something more daring and not been so safe for so long. Coming into my late twenties is scary, because I have this intense feeling that time is running out, the freedom to pick up, leave and go somewhere, the ability to party till 3am and still be fully functional at work the next day, the ability to eat an entire pizza and not feel it settling in on your tummy and thighs, the will to go play frisbee in the park, to randomly buy new clothes, to try new toothpaste, to run after a bus and not look ridiculous, to laugh loudly, to not know which fork is the salad fork, to have a million freak outs and laugh about them later.. My time is running out and I'm not so sure I know what to do or who I am. I still feel young, where I would much rather go bowling with friends and then to a bar and dance like a fool rather than do champagne brunches in fancy hotels. I guess, I need to separate what I think a 27 year old is to who I am right now because I sure as hell don't match the version in my head! Am I being unrealistic? Is it weird that I'm going to be 27 and I have no clue about anything in this world? 

Romy Luck!

A lot of people would think I'm being quite presumptuous actually naming a type of luck after myself, but if you knew me, you'd know that it is perfectly valid. I call it Romy Luck, when you have such ridiculously bad luck that you're just stunned and can only stare. I mean that movie "Just My Luck" has nothing on you!

I'm not talking about the horrible bad luck, but the luck that you have daily, in everyday situations. You know, like the kind of luck that prevents you from walking into a glass door after a meeting, or the kind that doesn't let you fall so hard in a bus while standing that an old lady gets up to give you her seat. That kind of luck. I truly and firmly believe that I do not possess that.

The other day, I was walking home from work and this giant golden retriever came over to say hi and when I rubbed is head, he jumped on me almost giving me a hug. And I thought "Oh this is nice" until I felt something hot and wet on my knee. Yeah. You got it. The dog PEED on me. Of course. I mean, you don't meet friendly dogs that don't pee on you right? Right. Or it's even more hilarious when you're walking to a coffee shop to catch up with friends and you get stung by a bloody giant red wasp. And your finger swells to twice it's size and it's SO PAINFUL! Like how does that happen????

It would also be the 3 minutes that when you take a break and watch a cat video on YouTube that your boss will appear behind you wanting to talk to you. After you make sure that the boss is busy, and slowly watch it, on a minimized screen. Romy luck is when you see a manhole, see that it's covered, confidently walk around it only to stick your leg into a hole next to the manhole. And of course, you will have a party to go to 2 days later, where you will wear a dress, bloody leg be damned.

It struck me yesterday when, while walking to my bus stop on my way to work, I was singing and I looked up to see my landlady walking towards me. It would totally look like I'm talking to myself. I mean all people are happy when they have loonies renting their homes. Totally. I mean, all the other times that I walk perfectly quietly to work, she doesn't show up. The ONE day that I decide to sing, tadaaaaa, she is there. Sigh.

It is also the tiny things, where the one day that you forget to take your coat and scarf, the crank up the AC at work. I mean, do you really have to know what you would look like as a corpse, with pale skin and blue lips and nails? Sheesh. There are some things in life that I would like to be blissfully unaware of! It would also be the time when you declare "I do not trip" only to fall flat on your face.

My Romy Luck came in strong when I went to a club recently. There I was, minding my own business, laughing at my best friend as she made a fool of herself on the dance floor when this guy comes up to me. He looks okay, t-shirt and jeans. I smile politely and attempt to turn away when he points at his empty glass and then points at my beer, indicating for me to give him some! Like are you freaking SERIOUS! Of course, he would ask me, the most unapproachable person there. I'm just stunned and I stare at him and then my friend before we both say "no!" and walk away. Then I spy him looking at all the glasses on the table, checking for alcohol that people may have left behind. EW!!

Some time passes and we are having a laugh at the dude, and then we hit the dance floor. Suddenly I feel a tap on my shoulder to see the same weird dude asking me to dance!!! I'm like what? Seriously, I know I may not be amazing or all that, but he is psychotic!!! I have standards. After turning him down, I stick to a friend and just stay the hell away from him. The night ends with him going on stage, snatching the microphone from the dude who's performing his gig and yelling "F*ck You! F*ck You! F*ck You!" into it! Like worse than the Kanye West / Taylor Swift moment!!! He was then thrown out after thankfully.

All the while, you're wondering, WHY would he even talk to me in the first place? He didn't talk to anyone else! Of course I would get hit on, to give him more alcohol, not the other way around.

These are just some tiny instances of having Romy Luck. Like the time when I walked into a tree while texting or the time that my cat decided it would be cool to put my earphones in her water bowl.

PS: Is it normal for cats to have an obsession with water where they put their prized possessions / things they like in water bowls? Like their favourite toys, my socks, my earphones, shoelaces, etc?

It would also be the time when you wander up and down a road that holds Bangalore's biggest clubs/restaurants/lounges in your pajamas looking for an ATM and only realising later when you understand the strange looks that people are giving you. They are wearing their evening best and you are in your polka dotted pink jammies. Or when you forget your keys, travel ALL the way across the city to get them from your mum's place only to realise your friend who is five minutes from your house has keys and could have saved you a two hour trip (one way).

I guess, with Romy Luck, my life won't ever be boring. There hasn't been one day where I've been like oh.. nothing interesting happened today.