What 20-Somethings Want
by Ryan O’Connell
You want to find someone who will pick you up from the airport. It’s such a kind gesture but also one you would expect from someone who loved you a reasonable amount. The thought of having to wait for a shuttle while others are embracing their loved ones on the curb might just be too much for your little heart to bear. Where’s your car full of love? Where are the people who are going to make you feel welcome in this city? And, no, you are NOT going to take a taxi. You have too many friends who like you WAY too much for you to be taking that nonsense. Right? Hello? I’M AT TERMINAL 3. WHERE ARE THE PEOPLE THAT LOVE ME? Dear god, people have started to hug on the curb. Come quick!
You want to live closer to your parents. It’s not because you need to see them more. God no! Who would ever do a thing like that? It’s for if you everwanted to see them. If their health took a turn for the worse, god forbid, or if you ever felt lonely and needed to just sleep in a home that felt warm and loved, you could do it. Living far away from them has its advantages but you’re starting to realize how much you miss out on by being on the opposite end of the country. If you lived in the same city as your parents, feeling safe and secure would just be one phone call and a twenty minute drive away.
You want to be “stable” and see yourself make real progress. You would love to find the key to adulthood (Um, I think I saw it at Crate & Barrel next to the colanders) and not want to get drunk at happy hour anymore. It’s quickly turning into unhappy hour and you’re trying hard not to become a casualty of your age. You want nothing more than just to make it through the twentysomething rain and land on a nice job, a nice couch that wasn’t purchased from IKEA, and, most importantly, someone’s nice dick and/ or vagina.
You want to develop a backbone and start saying no to having lunch with the random friend from high school. In fact, you want to abolish “catch up” lunches altogether. People are either in your life as it happens or not in it at all. Sitting through these elaborate brunches with people who once meant something to you but no longer make sense, and talking about how great your lives are going while reflecting on the good ol’ days is a slow form of masochistic torture. It feels like performance art: *INSERT SMILE HERE* and *INSERT “I’M IN A REALLY GOOD PLACE. HOW ABOUT YOU?” HERE*. You’ve been through so many lunches like this that you could practically do them in your sleep. In fact, you should probably just arrive to the restaurant 15 minutes early and place a giant stuffed animal in the chair in place of you and run out before your old school chum arrives. Don’t worry, they won’t notice! You can even attach a tape recorder and have it come on intermittently to say things like, “You look great! Can I have the Egg’s Benedict?” Or my personal fave catch-up topic, “I saw on Facebook that you two broke up. What happened?”
You want to know that you’re not insane, that there are other 24-year-olds have never been in a relationship before, or that other people have gotten too drunk and vomited on their taxi driver before and it’s all okay because this is growing up. Or something. You’re not actually sure. You never received an official manual but you figure that this is what it’s all about — feeling alienated and vomiting on strangers and never having as much sex as you would like. You just want to know that the things you’re going through aren’t unique, that other people are in the same rickety brokedown palace of a boat. I mean, you don’t mind being crazy so long as there are people out there who are equally as psycho. You’d prefer it if they were actually crazier than you, so you could feel good about yourself and where you’re at in your life.
You want a job, a vacation, heath insurance, validation, a back rub, a scalp massage at the place where you get your haircut, people who are jealous of you, an ex who won’t stop texting you when they’re drunk, Twitter followers, happiness maybe sorta, someone to buy you lunch at a fancy restaurant, a mentor who can tell you what the hell to do with your life, a reliable internet connection, a reliable human connection, a gift card to the grocery store, dinner parties with friends where everyone will pretend to have their crap together for just one night, a nice flirty text message to wake up to every morning for the rest of your life, for everyone to like you even if you don’t like anyone, and one of those nights that doesn’t end till 9 AM and reminds you what it feels like to be young and alive. Oh, and $$$. That’s all. Think you can get that for me? For us?
