And it’s Sunday again. It came so suddenly. The last couple of days just flew by. Maybe the last week seemed to pass by so fast because I mostly stuck to my daily routine, consisting of working out, my job and my blog. And seeing friends, of course. Recently, one of my friends came back from a few months travel and so we have been hanging out to catch up. She told me about all the amazing countries she visited, the awesome people she’d met and that she actually didn’t want to come back to Paris. (As a matter of fact, she’s only staying two weeks before flying back to Australia.) She said that people here would probably still have the same jobs, still live in the same place, still have the same troubles in their relationships. Well, although things might not be as boring as that, I do see her point.

After having had a drunk night out yesterday, I went for a walk this afternoon. Looking at the remaining Christmas decoration in the streets, seeing people getting rid of their Christmas tree which finally started to shed it’s needles, I suddenly became oddly aware of how transient everything is and that at the same time, nothing changes. One year just went by and I hardly noticed it. Sure, there have been quite some changes, I realized it as soon I was writing a long letter to someone I haven’t seen since 2013. It might be the fact that I’m turning 25 this year and that I’m about to have a quarter century crisis, but today made me questioning how much I have achieved in life so far.

On Sundays, people take their kids to the park or go see the grandparents, twenty-somethings go home to have lunch with their families, students who came to Paris for their studies are spending the last day of the weekend at home in the suburbs before taking the train back to the city. On Sundays, people take a break from the usual, everyday’s rush. They take the time to go for a stroll or for visiting a museum. On Sundays, everything seems to pause.

Sundays used to make me feel restless and I’m just slowly learning to appreciate them as a day which I can absolutely dedicate to myself. But sometimes, looking at the other park visitors makes me having second thoughts about my life. I awkwardly notice that my mum had already had me when she had the same age. After finishing her studies with successfully, she had found a stable job which gave her enough security and already founded a family. By that time, she was totally independent from her parents.

As for me, I dropped out of university, I don’t have any degree. I worked in the food service industry for a couple of years before getting a better paid job in an e-commerce enterprise. But I surely couldn’t provide for an imaginary kid, I couldn’t even get a cat. The last time I asked my mum to help me out financially is not that long ago and I also still live with my flatmate, which is great, but nevertheless, I think sharing a flat is something that you should only do for a certain period of time. As always, there are also exceptions, of course. But thinking of the people in their mid-thirties I’ve met and who still shared a flat, I know that I definitely do not want to make this my lifestyle.

In the 19th century men were considered as men as soon as they were able to grow a beard or go to war. Women got married at the age of 20 to 22 and often became mothers shortly afterwards.

I remember how weird I found it when the boys I went to school with suddenly started talking about doing their military service. And the girl who was the first one of our year to get married surely surprised me. So what makes us become adults, nowadays? When is the moment that we’re able to say “Now, my life is settled”?

Taking into account how fast our society changes and that there are so many more possibilities and career choices than 200 or even 20 years ago, it’s normal that finding oneself and being able to build one’s independent future has become a much longer process.

The good thing is that I won’t be able to do crazy things like buying a sports car until I figure out my next professional and personal steps. I can save that for my midlife-crisis. Maybe I will have my driver’s licence by then.