The funny thing about learning to walk is that failure doesn't faze you. You get back up and try it again and again and again until you can do it.

I'm beginning to see independence like that. I'm a very dependent person. I like to have people tell me what to do. I like having rules to follow. The idea of fumblng my way through the world all on my own, without any guidelines or anything to go by, scares me.

But I was just thinking. I'm almost 20 (ick... that's so old-sounding!) and I'm beginning to be brave enough to start fumbling through the world all on my own. I was just imagining my trip to the Coast next month.

--WHOA! Big thought right there! When I go to the Coast I'm going to stand there and try to imagine which little curvature I'm standing on of the whole western side of the United States. WOW! How small I'll feel!--

Okay, sorry. :)

I was just imagining my trip to the big city/the Coast next month. I was seeing myself and Jenny walking back from that massive bookstore by ourselves to my aunt's loft, if we decided to split up and go different places.

That is a huge step of independence for me. Walking through the streets of the big city without an adult nearby to protect me. Like I'm really an adult now...

Then I saw myself hurt by some mugger, maybe in a hospital, but not badly injured. Maybe I pepper-sprayed him or zapped him in time and we got away.

I saw my mom saying something like, "Now do you see why we'd rather have one of us go with you?"

A sober moment for me, I nod and look down in repentance.

But inside a spark is growing in me, one that says, "I survived that. I'm still alive. I can do more..."

Independence. I survived that fall; I can do more. I'll do this until I get it.

Or am I just envisioning stupidity? :) Maybe it is stupid to be walking around the streets of the big city without an "adult" beside me. And maybe it is stupid to feel like you're invincible. (Or immortal, as Switchfoot says.)

I guess I won't figure out till I try it.

-Stephanie