Tricksy Adulthood

Josh and I were IMing each other today, our usual brief bursts of logistics (who's picking up cat food, what the plan is for dinner, etc) and some general steam blowing-off. Josh was telling me about all the demands on his time today, and how he had so much work left to do, and I was feeling the same way--like there was more work that I wanted to do than would ever get done in the limited hours (not to mention attention capacity) I had to do it, and that there were too many competing demands on my time.

And I had a sort of mini-epiphany, which in hindsight (like most ephiphanies) seemed perfectly obvious: we've both pretty much shifted into that next phase of our work lives, where we've moved away from your stereotypical Gen-X, Office Space-type, semi-slacker work days, and towards that "I am a productive, full-fledged member of society with an actual career I strive to do well at" stage where we are actually spending most of our work days, well, actually working. Working a lot. Work work working our butts off, within the self-imposed (and really rather stressful) limits imposed by family (and sometimes, social life).

Now, how the hell did *that* sneak up on us? Tricksy adulthood...it just keeps coming and coming. I am every day more of a grownup, and there just isn't any going back. I just know that gray hair is next.

(Yes, yes, those of you who are older than my tender 36 years are now probably rolling your eyes and snorting at my suspiciously Peter Pan-like protestations. But I'm not really protesting. Just trying to be aware of the shift as it happens.)

And on another, completely unrelated note, for those of you who might care: looks like our grand get-our-friends-to-move-in-next-door scheme has been thwarted. We might have done it too, if it weren't for those meddling kids (you know, the kind who bid a gazillion dollars over the asking price). We hates them, precious. But we will try to keep a silver-lining attitude about it all.