“I’m seventeen and I’m crazy. My uncle says the two always go together. When people ask your age, he said, always say seventeen and insane.” –Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

I used to be seventeen and crazy. When I read Bradbury’s famous text my sophomore year of high school, I eagerly anticipated the day when I could call myself “seventeen and crazy,” without much thought as to what seventeen would bring. But with each passing year, I pay more attention to the expectation that accompanies my age. Eighteen meant I was an adult, able to buy spray paint and cigarettes (or not) all on my own. Nineteen made me a “baby” again, and forced me back into the uncomfortable role of a dazed and confused freshman. Now, a week into twenty, I feel as if I am expected to be a real person, to actually know something about the world.

But in actuality, I proudly prove that the struggle is real and live my life as a flipping hot mess.

When I entered high school, I was shocked by the appearance of peach fuzz on the lips of the upperclassmen passing me in the halls, confused by the lanyards casually clutching car keys in their metal clasps. Slowly, I became one of those cool upperclassmen with a car (not with the peach fuzz), and I transformed into one of the kids I had so admired at fourteen.

Now, my friends order drinks from the bar when we go out to dinner, and rarely do Shirley Temples make their way back to our table. Some are engaged. Some kids from back home post pictures of their children on Facebook.

And then there’s me.

Disney movies clutter my shelves, my cure for any bad day. Starburst wrappers have waged a hostile takeover of my desk, threatening to cover my numerous to-do lists and sticky note reminders. Big people stuff? Big people stuff is scary. People around me are making serious life decisions. Since when did I get old enough to make serious life decisions without parental consent?!

I paid taxes for the first time this summer. That was enough of the real world for me.

Gone are the days of being seventeen and crazy. Now, I enter the age of exciting uncertainty and few satisfying answers. The Red Hot Chili Peppers know my life: “The more I see, the less I know, the more I like to let it go. Heyyyyyyyyy oh. Whoa, oh whoa, oh whoa.” The “whoa”s clearly capture my perpetual confusion.

But out of this confusion are eleven lessons that I’ve learned despite the insanity. They cannot be taught. They cannot be found within the confines of a classroom. But here they are, born of nights denying our impending status as “real people.”

1) If you’re sleeping, you’re missing something.

2) School shouldn’t be your only focus. People should. Experiences should. Seek them out.

3) Never pass up a 3 a.m. pizza run.

4) If you are letting a friend make a fool of themselves alone, you are wrong. Get on their level.

5) Freaking out is OK. Letting the freak out define your mood for the rest of the day is not. There is beauty in everything. Freak out, hate your life, scream to the heavens, and then move on.

6) Don’t be “that kid.” Nobody likes “that kid.”

7) Sometimes, stress will force you to talk in some strange accent that resembles no other dialect in the world. Just go with it.

 8) It’s ok not to know what you’re doing with your life, or to not know what’s happening at any given time. No one else does either.

9) Don’t underestimate your abilities. You can do great things, and you can do them now. Go for it.

10) Things change. People come in and out of your life, tests come and go, heck, you change, day in, day out. Love what you have while you have it, and learn what you can from the experience.

11) The strangers you first meet will become your friends, mentors, and supporters. Love quickly, love easily, and trust in them fully. There’s no time to wait.

12) Strive to make people smile.

13) Believe that you can, and you will.

There you have it: The nonsensical musings of a 20-something striving for success and struggling along the way.

Struggle well, Sooners, and make that struggle all your own.

Kendall Burchard

Journalism

Sophomore

Reno, NV