All Is Grace

I went to a concert tonight.  Sort of.

I say sort of because…well…concerts have changed a bit since I went to them as a teen.  Or a young adult, for that matter.  And, friends?  For the record?

I am no longer a young adult.  I know this now.  If I had any doubt of that before tonight, I no longer have a single one.

See, the thing is, the “concert,” which was really a worship experience with a speaker, was really great.  Awesome music.  Two fantastic local bands (Yay, Amy, Jordan, Jon, and Aaron!!), relevant and contemporary worship music…so well done.  Excellent energy…friendly people.  Except…when I looked around, I realized…Good Lord, I could seriously be that girl’s mother.  And it wasn’t just one girl.  It was most of the people in the theater.  The speaker was 21.  I went tonight with my sweet friend Amy, who sang fabulously in the aforementioned band, and though she’s semi-close in age to me, she’s still young enough to definitely be considered a “young adult.”  She’s also at a different place in her life: single, working, free-spirited, not tied-down.  We hung out with her girlfriends at the concert, and headed to Friendly’s afterward…7 girls…eating and chatting and laughing.  Only…I wasn’t one of the 7 girls, really.

I was, like, the mom.  The mom who sat there and…I mean, I laughed along…I listened and interjected and agreed…but other than one other girl who has a 2-year-old (who had her daughter while in college, so, hello, 22), I was the only one there with kids, and, umm, I have 3.  And the oldest is almost TWELVE.  The girls were sweet.  And they never, ever gave me the feeling that I was out of place there with them.  I did that all by myself.  I just…had nothing to say.  It suddenly struck me that I’m seriously not young anymore.

And, to be honest with you, tonight I realized…I’m pretty ok with that.

Frankly, I’m 37 years old.  I have three children.  Married for 13.5 years.  Thirteen and a half years, folks.  The people I was with tonight, most of them haven’t even been old enough to date for that long.  If they started dating at 12.

So, here’s the thing:  I may feel 23.  I might look 30, if I’m super, super lucky and someone is being kind.  But…I’m 37.  I have laugh lines and crow’s feet and stretch marks and experience.  It’s who I am.  Tonight…it became very clear to me that it’s ok.  And I’m not going to pretend that just because I prefer to rock out to what the 25-year-old single folks sing along with…I should be hanging out with them.  If I could figure out where I fit in now, that would help, that’s for sure…but the young adult group…they’re great…they’re just not mine.