­In Bed With Billy Little Bits of History Repeating

Twenty year olds are stupid; with their naivety of everlasting life and the belief that their driving is absolutely the best, even though they manage to rack up more tickets than the elderly, they think they know it all. “Why do I have the right to say this,” you ask? The answer is that three years ago, I was one of them.

The truth is, knowledge literally does come and is learned through experience. No one is very experienced at the age of 20 — we do what we want, ignore our schoolwork and party, maybe even a little too much.

I’ve always imagined that during high school and college, the most important lessons are taught outside of the classroom. Thinking back to when I was 20, I definitely dated men that were older than me. I never experienced the issue of conflict in our age differences, but when I turned 23 just last week, I realized that it’s essentially not about the age of either partner in any relationship; it’s about levels of maturity, and how they meet and converge.

Jason and I had been dating for roughly four months now, and everything seemed okay — until we both realized the lack of communication that was going on between
us.

Spending the holidays with him and his family was a great experience, and I was glad I could share the holidays with someone other than myself for a change. We didn’t fight the entire trip, but the more time I spent with him, the more I began to realize that there were many, many differences between us.

For instance, one day while Jason was driving on Sideburn Road, I looked over at the speedometer and noticed that he was doing 60 mph in a zone that was set at 30.
My prior experience with speeding usually involved tickets from police officers back when I was 19-21, and had thus taught me to be more careful when driving.

“Jason, you do realize that you’re going like 30 miles above the speed limit, right?” I asked him with hesitance in my voice. “Well, I have a million tickets; it’s just the price I have to pay every now and then in order to do what I want.” Jason’s reply startled me and made me realize, at that moment, that he obviously didn’t care about getting a ticket.

It was almost as if he didn’t know or realize that, after a certain amount of points from getting so many tickets, his license could be in jeopardy, not to mention the lives of his passengers (me), and himself.

This was only one of the many examples that made me begin to realize that Jason’s level of maturity was certainly at a different level than mine. I mean I’m obviously not the most mature person in the world, but I can surely say that I’ve passed the portion of my life when I thought it wasn’t important to care about my driving, let alone the people who ride with me.

While I was worrying about my life and my relationship with Jason, my friend Brandon was having an even worse time dealing with the 20-year-old that he was dating, Stephan.

Stephan seemed like a nice person when I met him the first couple of times, but Brandon was slowly beginning to realize that Stephan’s lack of maturity was coming between their relationship, and even the relationships that Brandon held with our group of friends. We were all a couple of years older than Stephan, and with every comment he would make or action he would take, my friends and I found ourselves looking over at Brandon, who had the same face that we were all making towards him.

It got to a boiling point when Stephan made a comment towards me one night while at a drag show in the district. Stephan’s comment was so offensive that even Brandon did a double take. It was as if Stephan had gotten so comfortable in our group in just a short amount of time that he believed he could do and say whatever he felt like — that or he was just crazy.

Jason and I managed to work out most of our problems for the time; Brandon, on the other hand, figured that he was better off being single. Brandon realized that, although he may have really liked Stephan and wanted it to it work out between the two of them, he was making the right decision for both parties involved.

Because either situation — living in a relationship that is a lie or believing that your relationship isn’t a lie — is truly hurtful to yourself, and to the person you’re dating.
If you’re not happy in a relationship with someone, you shouldn’t stay with them out of pity — who wants that?

It’s never been about age. We all age differently, and some of us, unlike a fine wine, do not age well with time. It’s about learning what you can’t be taught, and recalling these lessons in the future as to not make the same mistakes you’ve made in the past, whether you’re dealing with college, family or even a relationship.

That’s why we date; we want to learn more about the people around us, and at the same time, more about ourselves. And obviously, the clichéd expression fits here just as well as it has for any other similar situation: if you don’t learn from your history, you truly will be doomed to repeat it in some form or another.

And I can promise you that repeating your mistakes is hell. So I leave you now with a couple of questions: what happens next . . . for you? Will you learn, or just let your repeating history be your own personal hell? Honestly, the choice is yours.