Exactly Where: Adulthood

I was always the kid who was in a hurry to grow up. I wanted to sit at the adult table on holidays and wanted to have the important conversations that occurred in the living room (rather than in the family room with the other kids). I wanted to watch serious TV and wanted to spend time by myself in the big city. I wanted have my own bank account that no one else could access and wanted to have the title to my first car solely in my own name.

With my 28th birthday last week, and my corresponding entry into the realm of my late 20s, I suppose there is no doubt that I am now a grown-up. I’m on my second car, with the title in my name (well, mine and the bank’s name), that I purchased without the assistance of anyone, and I’m well on my way to a mortgage down payment, which I will likely lay down without the assistance of anyone. I’m 800 miles away from those who think that I should have to check in daily, so I check in weekly if I feel so inclined. And I’m working in a job that dumps a surprising amount of responsibility on me on a daily basis. Many of my friends are married property-owners, thinking about whether children are in their near futures. Among those friends are other lawyers, doctors, professors-to-be, managers, etc.—all people who are not just the cogs in the wheel, but those who are charged in some way with deciding how the wheel will turn.

Being an adult sort of crept up on me, but like everyone else, this is what I’ve been preparing for throughout my youth. Unlike everyone else, though, I was the sort of odd child who thought that adulthood was exactly where I wanted to be.

Exactly Where: DC

I’ve wanted to live in Washington, DC since I was 16. Having been a bit of a political junkie for as long as I can remember—picking a favorite presidential candidate in 1988, religiously watching the State of the Union address every year, reading The Economist as a freshman in high school—everything felt right when I first arrived in the capital for my junior class trip. As we toured DC and its surrounding areas, I was excited to be where I thought it all happened. Seeing the Capitol Building gave me goosebumps, and I’m pretty sure that I stared somewhat slack-jawed at the White House. And it didn’t hurt that I was completely enchanted by the federal-style architecture and the grandeur of the government buildings. It just felt right to be somewhere that held so much history, and continued to play a vital role in the making of that history. I knew then that I would live in Washington, DC.

I spent two summers here during college. While interning, I would spend quiet evenings sitting alone at the back of the Jefferson Memorial, collecting my thoughts and feeling content with the knowledge that I was where I believed to be the center of the universe. Countless other short trips for conferences and vacations solidified my desire to make the city my permanent home. I would wander the Capitol grounds, all the while still feeling those goosebumps. And I spent my time in Chicago dreaming about the time I would spend away—one of the (true) reasons I gave a boyfriend for the end of a relationship was I knew that if we stayed together, I’d never live in DC. Nothing was going to stop me.

A few years later, with a law school summer and a year and a half of permanent residency under my belt, nothing has stopped me—I’m exactly where I always thought I wanted to be.