The Dolphins

"Man has always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much...while all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man...for precisely the same reason."
--Douglas Adams

I went to the beach with one of my dearest friends today. We've known eachother since we were ten - we share the same name, we are both writers, we are both slightly neurotic, we were both raised among hippies (she was raised by hippies) and we are both struggling with being twenty-five. She expected to at least be employed at this age, and probably have a novel published. I expected... I have no idea. I expected to be skinnier, I know that much. I expected to have traveled the world. We both expected that we'd know what to do with our lives by the old age of tweny-five. But we don't. She figures that this is what we are supposed to do at this age. Twenty-five is about experimentation, about exploring ourselves, our identities, and trying out new lives like new hats. I agree - that seems to be the appropriate thing to do.

And the funny thing is, even though we live in an uncertain world at an uncertain age (twenty-five), we both feel like this is a good thing and that we are on the right path, wherever that path may lead. It's scary has hell, don't get me wrong. Just because you kinda feel like you are on the right path doesn't make the path less frightening when you can't see where you're going.

We saw dolphins today. Dolphins have always been harbingers of good things. I can't remember a year that was bad after seeing dolphins in the summer preceeding it. I haven't seen dolphins in a long, long time.

So happy twenty-fifth birthday to my dear friend who shares my name and shares so many of my memories because she was in them. Turning twenty-five involves a lot of introspection, and I often think about how my early friendships formed who I am and who I want to become. Lauren, I hope that we will both find what we need this year. At least, that's what I wished for as the waves came rushing at my feet while I was searching the horizon for dolphins.