21.

So I was just looking at my old blog entries and the first one I wrote was basically about my 18th birthday. The reason why I'm getting all nostalgic is because today is my 21st birthday and I'm writing this to make amends for how completely stupid I sounded in that first one.

When I was younger, I had a thing about growing old. I wanted to be Peter Pan. I had this fear of dying (not irrational, most people feel the same) and used to tell myself that I never wanted to get old. But really, a child of about six/seven to think about death? Bit mental. I used to measure my height against the length of my bed and told myself that once my feet reached the bottom, then I had the right to worry about impending doom.

It's a little daft that I worried about climbing into bed to find that my feet would somehow hang off the end of it as a child - that I pinned so much hope on some wood, a mattress and some sheets.

At 5'7/5'8, I can assure you that I have indeed grown to the full length of my bed and funnily enough, I don't mind. I sometimes look down at my feet when I'm on my bed because I remember thinking those thoughts as a little kid, being so consumed with terror at the wooden frame and the distance between it and the soles of my feet. I suppose I wonder what my six year old self would say to the twenty-one year old version about all this growing older and taller business.

In the past three years, I realised that getting old isn't all that bad - I still feel the same as I did when I was younger and I imagine I'll still feel the same at fifty or sixty.

It's just something I managed to figure out as I, ironically, got older.