I was sitting on my laptop yestreday, waiting to talk to someone who had told me they would contact me through AIM and I was sorting through my list trying to find someone to talk to. It was odd to bring up my old IM list filled mainly with people from my high school years and early college expereince because I really had kept in contact with hardly anyone stillon the list.

It occurred to me that contact through Instant Messenging services I now reserved for more serious messengers with work related intentions. The shock was realizing that as I have grown older so has the way I view the Internet and technology in general. For my business needs, I wanted a reliable messenger with a serious template, not good old AIM where my away messages were a tool for telling my boyfriend how I felt that day over song lyrics.

Yep, its official, even though I do not feel as if I am old enough to be considered older, I am starting to have my flashbacks of my younger days and to tell you the truth it scares the beejesus out of me. <--- Right there is the perfect example as when I was younger I would have never thought twice about inserting profanity, but those were the days before my teachers beat that little rebellious streak out of my professional and colliegate writing.

Suddenly, half my friends are married, and those who are not are in serious relationships or have serious jobs. My little brother is almost done with college and police academy, I am practically married myself, and the first pet I bought after I moved out of my parents home has gray whiskers. While I refuse to admit it, the days of being too cool for the Backstreet Boys and Lipsmackers are long gone.

You know what really gets me the most?  Well as a concert rat since age 14, I used to be the one at all the shows.  I used to hang out with bands all the time until I was about 21/22.  Well, the Fallout Boys who I used to talk to and hang out with after shows of like 20 people have a Grammy. I could kick myself for never getting any signed stuff or hanging onto the demos as I bet I could make a pretty penny off of the teeny boppers now, but who knew!  All I have is old photos of clowning around at the now closed Boston Hard Rock club and the also closed Cleveland Grog shop.  (Well the Grog shop is there, but its new and shiny, not like the crappy one where you could literally get locked in the bathroom since the door jammed!  Trust me, I have been there done that.) 

And the new bands that are coming out of the same clubs are younger then me.  Yep, that's right the bands I would have loved to chill with if I was still back in the late teens early twenties are younger then me.  There go my silly lil crushes, as dating a 20 year old now seems like a crazy farfetched idea.  I am officially the old one in the mosh pit now, and I am not thinking I like it much! 

In their place, I have a schedule for each day and committments I have to take care off. Bills I pay, my regular TV shows that sadly barhopping never gets in the way of as I would rather stay home now, and I actually get along with my parents. That last one may be the oddest one of all, but yes my days of teen angst and fustration are behind me and I actually can socialize with my parents without feeling out of place. If you told me that just a short six years ago while I was a college freshman I would have thought you were crazy.

Yet, I think for anyone who is my age, in the middle twenties, this is one of the oddest periods of life to go through and I think you get what I am trying to say. We are still too young to be talking about being old, but it seems like the last five or six years have left us with adult respsonsibilites and life somewhat sneakily. I am not sure when I became a person who stopped partying every weekend and watched regulary scheduled program with a meal I cooked at home, but sometimes I feel tricked. I never said I wanted to grow out of my best years so quickly!

Oh well, on the bright side at least boy bands really have died, unless you are 13 or 14. But wait, that is how old I was when everyone liked them, Christ, the silly kids and their Jonas Brothers were probably us when we were younger, but why did it seem we acted so much older! Its funny to look back on how we thought we were hip, and look at kids today and realize just how unhip we probably were. A clash in views or blissful ignorance? I don't know, but sometimes I still wish my life revolved around that road trip to DC, a tank of gas, and if my boyfriend was going to call me or not tonight!