A recent post by Jason0x21 raised a sidebar issue, and generated some excellent comments, on the issue of what it means to be a grown-up these days. It is, I think, all too easy to fall prey to the delusion that there's a timeline for your life that is "normal" and to feel that you're coming up short if you're not living up to that false ideal. It's all bullshit, of course, and mostly just tap-dancing around the belief that there's Something Wrong With You if you're not a straight, white, married person with kids. Because that's the way everyone was back in the golden age of whenever-the-fuck now isn't. I feel like I've been lucky to know folks over the years who have made a number of different choices. Some worked. Some didn't. Some worked at first and then didn't. Some I'd try and some I wouldn't. But it all comes down to making your choices for yourself and not for some fake ideal that never existed in the first place anyway. This xkcd strip (linked to by one of Jason's commenters) says it better than I'm doing right now.

"there were never any good old days; they are today; they are tomorrow" - Eugene Hutz