Peter Bjorn And John ~ Young Folks

This song, like many others, reminds me of my first summer in Edmonton. Of course, it had come out the year before, but with many other things in my life, I'm never very up-to-date on music (yes, even with this music blog I'm doing!).

That was an interesting summer that I've been thinking about a lot lately. It's only fitting, then - considering today's song - that that summer marks a change in the friendships I make. Before living in Edmonton, most of my friends were older than me. Afterwards, most of my friends became younger than me. I'm going to take a paragraph or two to ruminate on that...

I remember this discussion I had with my aunt, a year or two before that summer. I was talking about feeling out of place because the friends I was making were all older than me. This was not something to be overly concerned with, she reassured me. For most of her life, she has been attracted to people of certain ages. In her twenties, her friends all seemed to be thirty-five. In her thirties, she spent her days with twenty-seven-year-olds. By her forties, she gravitated back to the thirty-five-year-olds.

This is a rough description of a conversation that had quite the impact on my life, and for that I apologize. The idea of being attracted to a certain age of a person rather than the personality or common interests of my friends took some time to adjust to. Once I was comfortable with it, though, I clung to this notion and allowed it to shape my perception of friendship. There was less questions about favourite bands or the latest book some one had read and more or an emphasis on, "so...what year were you born?" I'm not sure if either of those two questions can a good friend create.

A year after the conversation, I began to make friends with people my age. They were all still a few months older than I, but at the same stage of preparation for the "real world." It was a relief to finally find a group of peers I had SO much in common with, and I began to worry less about lacking the life skills of the people I hung around with. In fact, I may have brought many life skills to the social group I corrupted in university...but that's a different story altogether. Our time together may have been short - a mere two years - but I made some friendships there that will last a lifetime. As I've written about before, it's nice to have a solid group of people to go through different life stages with.

Suddenly, I was thrust from that world - the Land of Lotus Eaters, nights of writing and rewriting, reading and researching, chatting and wheelie-chair racing - and into the "Real World." Or so I thought I would be. I took a job working for an outdoor museum in the largest city within a day's trip to my hometown. Ah, back to the dry air, brown ditches and hot summers of the prairies. I was excited to have a job outside of retail and thought it would be great to finally make some money!

Me, the university grad with my older sister's connection, walked into the first day expecting to find like-minded historians and perhaps a few fellow closet-thespians. While we all had a passion for the arts, and became quite attached to the historical accuracies of our characters and the buildings we showed off to visitors, I quickly realized that I was among the older group of employees...and not overly attracted to making friends with the rest of the people in the older group. (Of course, my older sister's connection will always be a dear friend to me, and I have love for everybody I worked with at the museum.) Instead, I gravitated to the group of individuals who had a)finished their first year in university b)hadn't even started university. Why this attraction? ...

I took this temporary position because I was leaving for England in the fall. My friends from university were all talking about grad school and academia and I needed to take a break. A long break. A decade break. But school was the only thing I had ever known. School was the only thing I thought I had ever been good at. Academia was my thing. I was, for the most part, beginning my quarter life crisis...

I remember bawling the day I realized I was leaving Vancouver. I must have spent four hours just sitting in the study lounge, unable to concentrate on real, important school work because I was so distraught with this realization. I tried walking around campus, trying to calm down, but I couldn't. Vancouver was where I had found myself. Vancouver was the first place I felt at home. How could I leave a place once I finally felt at peace with it? I had known for several months that I would leave after my degree, but actually coming to terms with it brought me to tears.

So, here I was, two months later in Edmonton, starting a new life that I thought would only be temporary. I was only supposed to be here for four months, and it'll be the fourth anniversary of my arrival this spring. The girl who sat beside me in our training course will convocate. Other dear friends have already left this city to continue their education. And I remain, stuck in this rut...making new friends who are just starting university now. I continue to get older, but my friends always stay the same age...

The other night I was talking with two of these new friends. The one is in her first year of uni, the other in his third. I made comments to shows that were on television when I was in junior high, and they have no idea what I'm talking about! I share my opinions on life and they remind me of how I, too, used to be so convinced that there was one truth, and that my mentor knew all the answers. In a moment of frustration, I told them I couldn't do this. How could I explain to these "young folks" all the things I have learned so far? It doesn't matter, even if I could put it all into words, because they're "young folks." They don't really care about them "old folks"...

I wonder what great adventure lies next for me. What age will I gravitate towards in my next city? And how long from now will that new story begin?