define: adult

i was thinking about what it might be like to be an adult. seeing as i wouldn't really know how that feels, i looked up "adult" in the dictionary, and got two rather confusing answers.

1. a person eighteen years of age or older

2. a mature, fully grown person


but how can one be eighteen and be fully grown?


how much living do you need to do to be fully grown? because i'm closer to eighteen than nothing, and i'm sure that i'll need a bit more time to be fully grown. a good thirty years, i'd say.

holden, after finally leaving school, isn't even a certifiable adult yet. he can't buy a drink.

if you think about it, what exactly does the world expect of teenagers, even after they've outgrown their teenage years? they say there's this whole "smooth transitioning" junk. excuse me, but let me tell you, nothing is smooth. exhibit a: "smooth jazz". that is a bigger lie than "you'll actually use the quadratic equation, i promise!" jazz and being smooth have about as much in common as kangaroos and can openers. the point of jazz isn't about being smooth, and the point of transitioning is not about being smooth, either. transitioning is about moving from one thing to another, and no matter how slowly or "smoothly" you try to make it, it will always be hard.
always.

because people don't like change. they try to deny it, every single one. but it's the truth.

i think the thing with holden is about going from school to the world, that change, not from school to school. i believe that school is just the same thing to holden, no matter where or when it is. people say it's complicated, but if i was holden, i would just see school. home. and the outside world. that's it. to leave home and go to school, that's a big change. but both, more or less, are the sheltered places of the three. in the real world, no one's gonna be there to remind you to brush your teeth or make sure you send in your job application or have supper ready on the table when you get home.

you're just out there all alone, with your rules and your feet to guide you...