twix away.

'm a little.... no, i'm quite overwhelmed, shell shocked really, by an article i just read, sent to me by my Dad about my generation. I sit here, in a Starbucks, in a city that i don't live in, jobless, having just moved in with my parents, reading this article about "twixters" and their inability to grow up. I feel exposed to say the least. I beg you to read this article. If you are in my generation than you will understand yourself better than you thought possible, if you aren't in my generation, than you will be able to help us where we are begging for a hand.

I must warn you. It's like reading a small book. it took me about 30 minutes to read the entire article. it's not swift article, but it's well worth it. please stick with it and tell me what you think about it, be honest, be brutal.

http://www.mobilizingstudents.com/ms/Mobilizing_Students/blogs/Entries/2010/7/23_The_Twixters__A_Cutlural_Shift_For_18-25_Year_Olds.html

I'm going to comment on a few moments that hit me hard. and i must say, that there were moments that i had tears in my eyes and my heart was racing. This is how i feel. And i have felt as though i didn't know how to explain my confusion and my lack of direction. I'm not proud of it and i don't want it to continue, but i feel so much better knowing that someone gets it. so....

"To compensate, a lot of twixters go back to school for graduate and professional degrees. Swann, for example, is planning to head back to business school to better his chances in the insurance game. But piling on extra degrees costs precious time and money and pushes adulthood even further into the future."

- this hit home for me.... because i have been researching graduate programs for the past ooh, six months or so.... and moved in with my parents in transition to grad school.... maybe it is merely another way for me to delay complete adulthood. i don't know.... that's the point... I DON'T KNOW.

Galantha's frenetic hopping from school to school, job to job and city to city may look like aimless wandering. (She has moved six times since 1999. Her father calls her and her sister gypsies.) But Emerging Adulthood's Arnett--and Galantha--see it differently. To them, the period from 18 to 25 is a kind of sandbox, a chance to build castles and knock them down, experiment with different careers, knowing that none of it really counts. After all, this is a world of overwhelming choice: there are 40 kinds of coffee beans at Whole Foods Market, 205 channels on DirecTV, 15 million personal ads on Match.com and 800,000 jobs on Monster.com Can you blame Galantha for wanting to try them all? She doesn't want to play just the hand she has been dealt. She wants to look through the whole deck. "My problem is I'm really overstimulated by everything," Galantha says. "I feel there's too much information out there at all times. There are too many doors, too many people, too much competition."

-i have been called a gypsy by my own parents. i get that. i understand it. i am overwhelmed with choices, options, doors, TOO MANY people, TOO MANY options...... what to do, what to do.....

"They're not just looking for a job," Arnett says. "They want something that's more like a calling, that's going to be an expression of their identity." Hedonistic nomads, the twixters may seem, but there's a serious core of idealism in them."

-um.... wow. i don't want to settle, that is so big for me. i'd rather work a job that is a calling than work a job just to make some money. that's huge to me. but i know that it's not realistic, and it's so frustrating. sounds like giving up doesn't it?

Young people know that their material life

will not be better than their parents'," Apter says. "They don't expect a safer life than their parents had. They don't expect more secure employment or finances. They have to put in a lot of work just to remain O.K." Tough love may look like the answer, but it's not what twixters need.

- i could break down on this one. i feel like a wee little sensitive one that just needs compassion and encouragement because i just don't know what's next.

by my age, my parents were married, pregnant and in texas with a job they loved. by my age my brother and wife had one child and one on the way, in colorado. i feel behind, but i know i'm not. i feel cultural pressure and it can be suffocating. many times i want to just hide in my room (my childhood room as it may be with floral border and yellow walls) and ask everyone to stop with the pressure to "grow up", get married, find some job that is impressive and... succeed. but hiding in my room won't get me anywhere. it's merely receding. So i do what i can. even if it doesn't make money, unrealistic as it may be, because the work is what heals me. i've said this many times and my dad said it again recently, "i feel God's pleasure when i run" as said by what's his name in Chariots of Fire. I feel God's pleasure when i do the work that He puts me in. And i'm desperate to do it more, but sometimes it doesn't make money, sometimes it's not impressive..... so i try and stay a float. and do what i can to... well, grow up, with work, with love, with education, family, friends....

i guess Peter Pan needs to move on.... i'm not going to re-read this because i'll probably edit down to little to nothing... so... here it is. my heart on "paper". tear it up.

Day 1.

Today i had my first experience on a film set. I'm officially a film extra. i thoroughly enjoyed the work. Look for my name to come up on IMDB here pretty soon, i'll keep you up to date. Here is the website for the film i was in and will be on crew this afternoon. http://whereibeginmovie.com/

I hope that through this work i will be able to gain knowledge of people, places and other pieces that need actors and workers. i'm ready for it.

Here's an image of me on set, which for the morning was a grocery store.

that's all for now.

snap to it people. there's so much to be had. we've got to find it.

natalie