What does turning 21 mean?

Age cannot imply maturity with certainty. Maturity is defined by the completeness, the depth and the soundness of one’s thoughts, this, regardless of age. I don’t feel anymore matured than what I was yesteryear. But turning 21 serves as a rude reminder of how my one and only dream to travel and live around the world remains yet to be realized. This is not to say that being 21 is too old an age to realize this desire, but the fact that I’m still stuck here now (and for the foreseeable future), making not even the slightest effort to fulfill that dream is disturbing. It is disturbing because a growing part of me is starting to believe and accept the fact that this dream of mine will never come to be. I believe that the geographical mobility of a person diminishes with age. In part, this is due to a person’s decreasing ability to adapt to a new environment as he or she grows older. And then there are also the pull factors that tie you down and bound you from leaving. Think marriage & family, illnesses or the apparent lack of cash. It is disconcerting how perfectly one can blend into the kind of life she dreads so much, simply by putting on office attire and trooping in files together with the rest of the lifeless corporate souls along Raffles Place. Imagine doing this day after day, year after year, until the monotony eats you out. What’s next you ask? Get married, have kids, retire and bid your time to see our Maker in Heaven. How different is your life from the person living next door? It is pathetic to grow old thinking how plain and uninteresting your entire life has been. Having said this, I do not need nor do I crave to be outstanding in anything. I just want to be assured that for all the bullshit in life I’ve been made to go through, it is not easily replicable in someone else’s life story.