Turning Twenty ;)

So what does turning twenty imply? The end of glorious hormones filled teenage? Or is that you have graduated from oneself into another yourself for this society ? Questions apart all that could clutter down to my mind is "it definitely means you have just completed your second decade on planet earth totally alive and still going to live." ;)

Why am I talking about it now ? Well, simple enough,one of my friends turned twenty in one of the premier Insti of India ( Well we don't study there, we just visited :P) and she declared the day before, “So our teen days come to a BIG end”, and it struck us that we were not kiddies anymore and all of sudden we all looked so big, grown up and grumpy with stress lines in our forehead.

The realization struck my friend harder than on me. I turned 20 a month ago, and had come to terms with the reality of the situation witn great difficulty. She was just talking down the fact, that I had just digested. Not talking but so sheepishly lamenting like a drunk ( Only 7up and lemon..No Hot drinks allowed ! :( ) And so she held that oh-no-so-nostalgic look, reminiscing our adolescent attractions, crushes, crazes blah blah..from school gates to tutition gates (Well She could not exactly number them ! ;)). But I knew it from the look on her face that she was full of fond memories, romantic or otherwise (I am not sure of that :/ ).

And when I actually think of it, my adolescent years were also artistically adorned with incidents that bring a sweet smile and sometimes even a hot blush to my face! Not because I have loads stories of secret crushes, or of few snatched stolen glances, but because we used to see it in abundance around us (not the ‘kisses’ part). We used to giggle profusely (yeah, the girlish giggle), used to keep count on how many boyfriends the most popular girl in class had, discuss scandalous stories about the school, the teachers etc which seemed to originate from an entity well known to all : ‘hearsay’.

Most of the time we would bet on whether it was true or just a fleshy piece of gossip. And interestingly, each one of us would forget the bet because the next scoop would come up within no time, leaving no room for further discussion on the old topic. Our world used to centre on these things. Thinking about it day in and day out, being an important hobby.

If crushes and crazes occupied one half,the other half pulled out the nerd in us. To beat your friends in this subject and that. Studying hard for that extra 2 marks, that would place you on a ledge higher than the rest. Though this was one area no one could avoid, there were a lot of people who were well at distance with studies.

I was among the naughty and smart lot (ahem !?) who was always affected by the mischief’s we used to do. In studies as well as everything else, I mean. Never once had I faced my teachers’ wrath on the grounds that I do everything else other than study. Somehow I managed stay aboard in school. Well College is a different ball game. That’s one thing I am quite proud of.

But when I speak of being a part of mischief’s, my friends and I (Mrs.Nirmala taught us "Never use me or I in first place") knew quite well where to draw the line and so successfully kept the blues at bay. Well sometimes we managed to go ashore and return safely, only after much anticipation. We were never perturbed by the threats of the teachers. And seldom got caught. That is, catch-me-if-you-can Leonardo.
And we always had the beauty of getting caught for the slightest of crimes! Always and especially from Mrs.Joes. And how I wished I could take over the uncanny knack of freeing from the toughest of knots. Alas ! I could never apply that technique for small issues and to her.

So those were the things when we were going on 17. By the time I turned 18 I am at college. And what a vast change it was. Not in us. But the two institutions, school and college. Getting rid of the school uniform, not having to walk about in an assembly line was all good. But I still used to miss my school and the carefree time I spent there. It took a couple of months to fine-tune myself to the new system.

We saw each other turning 18, then 19 and now finally 20. And do I see any difference? Ummm…at 18 we were proud of our status as a ‘major’ from that of a ‘minor’. We were still the same old school girls ready to burst into fits of giggles at any opportune moment. We discussed fashion, films, school life and…yea…that’s about it. At 19, the effects of being in an ‘all girls’ college were dominantly visible and we used to discuss articles in the newspaper, mostly related to atrocities on women. Fashion and films were still a hot favourite.

And at 20 I guess, we are more or less the same. We still feel we are 15 and get irritated when someone randomly pops up and starts giving us advice. We are mature enough to understand things but do get unnerved when pestered. And that, I think is a sign of adolescence. And at 20, you are actually supposed to behave like a woman. And often, you just can’t help being the child you are.

And so when my about-to-be-twenty friend exclaimed, ‘So teen days come to a BIG end!’ I asked her, ‘Do you really think so ?’
With a wink she asked me, ‘What do you think machi ?’
I gave her one of my impish smiles and told her ‘Well yes, teen years are over. But pots like us, never seem to grow out of it.’

Yes, when it comes to age, we like to remain static. Now I know what it means to be young-at-heart! ;)