Remember when birthdays were something to look forward to rather than something dread? Remember when you counted down the days in anticipation? Yesterday I turned twenty. I celebrated alone in my flat with a large bottle of vodka. It was dark when I awoke this evening. I knocked back three cups of instant coffee and went to buy something liquid to help with the hangover. Just as I was going into the store, a little kid ran full tilt into my legs. Its mother yanked it away by the arm and said ‘Michael, say sorry to the man.’ The kid started bawling and never apologized and the mother was too stressed to say anything else but that’s not the point. Why did she call me a man? That was so unfair of her, nobody has ever called me a man before. I don’t feel like one. Not yet. Like my Dad, or my Grandad. What am I supposed to do, go home and mow the lawn? Wash the car? Should I sit in a rocking chair with a blanket over my knees? I need to buy myself a pipe.
Oh, I don’t like this feeling at all.
