…and I don’t feel any older. My grandmother asked me if I did last night when she called to wish me a happy birthday. I’m pretty close to my grandparents and we all joke around a bit so when I responded, “No, do you?” she just laughed and said “Honey, I’ve felt old for a long time now.”
I wish I could say I feel my age but I don’t and I don’t have anyone to blame but myself. I couldn’t decide what I wanted to study in college so I just took a crap ton of mostly unrelated classes for the first three years. Then, once I settled on nursing, I still had to take nursing school prerequisites while took a while. And then Neil got his student teaching placement an hour away from our college and I had to find another nursing school to go to. Even though I do have a degree, it’s in independent studies and I can’t really do much with that. So here I am, 25 years old, still with a year of school to go before I graduate as a nurse.
But then again, I have accomplished a lot since I’ve been an adult. I married my high school sweet heart when I was 21. That’s younger that most people get married these days and it’s definitely not for everyone, but it was the right thing for Neil and myself. We have paid off more than half of our student loans, and Neil’s only graduated a year ago. We’ve lived in three different towns, none of which was our hometown. We’ve raised two awesome obedient dogs (hey, not everyone can) and we’ve successfully NOT gotten pregnant on purpose because we are not ready yet. I’ve had several awesome jobs but nothing as awesome as starting my own photography business and working for myself. And, to top it all off, I’ve been apart of maintaining a strong, loving marriage which is also something not everyone can do. So, maybe I’m not where other 25 year old women are in their lives but I am exactly where I need to be.
OK, enough reflection. Here are some pictures I took this afternoon when I got home from nursing school meetings. Lake level is 367:
To give you some reference, if you’re standing on the back porch, looking at the lake, our wood pile is on the right side of the yard. On the other side of the wood pile starts our neighbor’s yard. Our whole property sits a little higher than our neighbor’s while their house sits further back from the lake than ours.
This is the neighbor’s yard, flooded. Picture taken standing in our yard, from the right side of the woodpile.
And then from the left side of the wood pile.
And here’s a few pictures of Ben, just for good measure.
“Oh, hey mom.”
Who cares if you don’t feel your age. I’m 2 years older then you and i don’t feel my age, nor do I look it (neither do you I should add) and I’m happy about that.
That first picture of Ben is sooo adorable 🙂 I love his colour!
I think you’ve accomplished A LOT in such a short period of time. But I feel like that sometimes. I took 5 years instead of 4 to do my degree. And now, I’m doing my M.A (another 2 years). After this, I plan on going to law school (3 years). But in the back of my head, I keep thinking “OMG, I’ll almost be 30 by the time I’m finished!” which scares me A LOT because I *do* want to get married, pay off my loans, buy a huge house, have kids etc. but I feel like time is so short :/
As I commented on your previous post (although late), I hope you had a wonderful birthday 🙂 XO!
Awesome! I hope you had a great Birthday. 🙂 It’s so nice and fun to see another couple go through the similar thing we did (re: high school sweethearts). Too bad we don’t live close by, haha.
Benny! 🙂
You won’t feel any different until 27. I’m going to be 29 in a month. 29!!! Holy cow…
Anyway, thinking of ALL of you in the south. A tornado hit about 20 minutes from my mom in TN. 🙁 Last year they had serious flooding at the TN river and I hope no one has to go through that crap again.
I still don’t feel 27 and I’m abut to turn 28 soon. I don’t think I will every feel my age. 30 may hit me hard, but I think it will be fine.