Growing up sucks. Bills, insurance, work, and responsibilities: I’m trying hard to keep it all together.

But I’m young. And the fact that I’m eating cereal right out of the box because I can’t afford milk is just one of those side effects of trying to find yourself…right?

At least that’s what I thought. Until I went back to school this weekend (for the first of many weddings) and realized that everyone had gone and grown up while I was searching for pennies to pay for my coffee in New York.

It isn’t that I’m stuck back in my college days. In fact, I did quite the opposite after graduating. I moved further away (literally and figuratively) than anyone from home. But when I went back I realized that while I was still trying to find myself they had already done just that. With steady jobs, big rocks on their fingers, wedding planning and bed times.

My already confused and heartbroken self had just encountered one thing I had never planned on: my friends, all 23 and 24, were acting old.

Now I’m not saying that they were stiffs, we all drank and danced and had a really good time at the wedding. Sh*t, they even played Chubby Bunny by the bonfire (yes, there was a bonfire). But at the end of the night, when we got back to our hotel room, everyone was tired and wanted to go to bed…. at midnight. Read More »

Every day someone muses about how fast kids are growing up in today’s society; how sexually charged their lives are, how full of mixed messages.

“Kids don’t get to be kids anymore!” is what everyone seems to be saying, “They’re becoming inexperienced adults!“

I don’t usually buy all our hyper-sexualized tween hysteria (I’m pretty sure most of this stuff has been going on for decades—just without YouTube), but after coming across this story, I can’t help but wonder what the hell is going on.

According to sources, a 6-year-old boy was recently caught running a ‘sex club’ out of his elementary school in Melbourne, Australia.

The boy has recently been placed in counseling for allegedly urging another 6-year-old to “perform a sex act” and “expos[ing] himself in front of other students.”

It’s hard to tell if parents and school officials are blowing an innocent act of kindergarten rebellion out of proportion (as we are want to do these days), or if our culture has really and truly gone off the deep end in terms of sexual exposure. Read More »