A few years ago you were absolutely okay with eating pizza for dinner each night, living in a tiny flat with five buddies and rocking out on the dance floor till dawn. The time flies though, and you steadily head towards your third decade.
Suddenly you find yourself in your late 20s, slightly obsessed with the opposite types of activities and past times.
Here are 20 things I had no idea I would become so excited about a few years ago!
1. Cooking elaborate dishes
You know you are in your late 20s when pasta no longer sounds like a decent dinner option. We now crave to savor exquisite tastes and opt to spend weeks learning to cook something gourmand (and Instagram-worthy) like Coquilles Saint-Jacques and roasted potato salad with candied walnuts as a side dish.
Yes, it takes a hell of a lot of time, practice and a few kilos of wasted food, but we feel extremely proud as we read all the rave comments under the photo!
2. Local organic vegetables
You’ve come to love Saturdays even more! You get up early and dash directly to the farmer’s market for fresh veggies and fragrant bundles of salads. You then happily spend the afternoon chopping and packing them into Tupperware to make the taste last longer.
You always shop seasonal and inspect each item with notorious meticulousness before stacking it into the basket. Some vendors already know you by name and even make small discounts, and there’s a list on your fridge with of all organic shops around your area with notes where you should by what. Also, you have even attempted growing some veggies and herbs at your windowsill to keep basics at stock all the time and save some money from your food check.
3. Being concerned about your health
It’s not that you are getting old, but some extra concern about your well-being has become a “thing”. Suddenly, you became aware of all the negative impacts of certain foods, toxic liquids in your household and even harmful bacteria hiding in the hospitals.
You schedule regular appointments to your dentists and GP, you even once consulted a nutritionist and then you were over the moon happy when you realized your new insurance covers vision! You now realize the value of working for a company that offers the best health insurance packages.
4. Professional cleaning services
The truth is, you’ve never liked cleaning up. Living in a cramped, cluttered cave with wrappers behind the couch was pretty fine in college, yet absolutely unbearable in your late 20s. Now, every other weekend, you crouch and run sprints around the house with a vacuum cleaner. Sometimes you feel like if someone would gift you a year of professional cleaning services, you would immediately marry them!
5. Massages
A night on a friend’s couch leaves you with a terrible pain in the neck. So does the office chair, spending too much time driving, a bad mattress and loads of other activities. It seems like we got into our late 20s and all our pains and aches intensified.
A 60 minute massage session with fragrant oil dripped all over your poor body is no longer a luxury, but an actual necessity!
6. Having a preference of wine
Long gone are the days you could drink anything that had at least a slight grape aftertaste. A typical conversation with your significant other at a wine cellar now looks like:
“Why are we taking that Alsatian Riesling again? I’m not sure that year 2012 will pair well with the fish.”
“But, babe, we’ve drank that red dry Bordeaux last weekend and I didn’t like that nutty aftertaste, remember?”
At the venue, you can spend a good half an hour inspecting the wine menu and shooting questions at the sommelier.
7. Going to bed before midnight
Why should anyone sane stay out till dawn and rave like a madman to get up at 6 am still hangovered and absolutely devastated? All the cool kids like you are going to bed early.
A “big night out” now is more like – let’s cook something cool, drink a bottle of good wine and go wild by trying out a fancy dessert.
8. Enjoying music from back in the 90s
You still remember lyrics to most ‘N SYNC songs, right? And chances are, no one’s going to make fun of you when you mention that in public. In most cases, you’ll end up doing a karaoke session and going as low as “Hit Me Baby One More Time” while having the time of your lives!
9. New home appliances
For a second you may feel a little embarrassed by being so excited with your new super-awesome self-cleaning espresso machine, but it all goes away once you see how anxiously envious your friends become.
Your wish-list now has quite a lot of incredible items you would die to have, from a baked taco shell toaster to a pro noodle maker to make your own spaghetti from organic ingredients!
10. Having a seat at the concert
No matter how much you love that band, you will not go to their live gig if there’s no sitting places left! Rubbing elbows with fellow fans in front of the stage (and secretly wondering if that guy in front of you will smack your nose or not) doesn’t sound cool anymore.
Neither does a free ticket for a Katy Perry concert…without sitting.
11. Quality clothes
You are no longer friends with Forever 21 and H&M. At some point, you’ve started feeling really awkward when walking in. Besides, you are tired of throwing away another pile of tiny dresses, small t-shirts and shrunken sweaters.
In our late 20s, we like to spend more on clothes only if it’s actually worth the price. A pair of rubber designer flip-flops for $20 is a rip-off, but a pair of good suede loafers is a wise investment.
12. Having “productive” weekends
There’s no longer an “epic” story to tell on Monday about getting wasted, hitting 10 clubs in a row and waking up in another state. Those days are past and now you love telling stories about how hellishly productive you’ve been during those two so-called rest days.
You’ve cleaned the entire flat, cooked for a five-person dinner party (with two dish changes!), finished reading the Ernest Hemingway biography, washed the car, cut the lawn and even had time to try a new hairdo!
13. Dinner parties
No longer “you bring your food, I give my space to chill” types of parties, but fancy Martha Stewart-inspired feasts with matching napkins, two glasses for water and wine, at least three different types of forks, fresh floral bouquet (that you’ve struggled to make two hours after watching that DIY video), napkin holders and candles.
You have even thought about ordering calligraphy for name cards, but is seemed like too much, right?
14. Establishing a sacred morning routine
Because morning defines your mood for the whole day! You can sacrifice those 15 extra minutes of sleep for a series of yoga exercises and extra five minutes in a warm shower to gather your thoughts.
You’ve ditched coffee for a glass of hot lemon water, you typically cook salads and smoothies instead of cereals and get your clothes prepared in the evening. All those procedures are sacred and you can not be deprived of any of it!
15. Documentaries
Watching soap operas and reality shows? Duh, we are so over it! Instead, we prefer to actually learn something new while interacting with the telly or opt for some beautifully puzzling art-house movie for entertainment.
16. Brunches
Will our generation someday be named as “the brunchers”? It seems like everything we do involves a brunch. What shall we do today? How about having a brunch at that new awesome cafe around the corner? No brunch offers? This place sucks! I will never tag it on Instagram, even though the coffee looks pretty.
17. Private space
Sharing is no longer caring when it comes to your “own space”. You are okay to pay that dreadful solo rent price, so that you won’t have to justify an hour in the bathroom, while listening your whining roommate on the other side of the door.
Or your music choices, or your right not to wear pants around the house. The freedom to do whatever you want in your space is almost overwhelming!
18. DIY’ing
In your late 20s, your YouTube subscription is full of DIY channels – from nail art to authentic reed basket weaving. I’m not even mentioning how many pictures you have pinned on your secret DIY Pinterest board.
During the last year you’ve probably attempted making all kind of stuff, from that shoe holder planter to a wood-burning camp stove.
19. Treating pets like children
Because yes, it is absolutely acceptable to dress up both of your cats in lovely Santa costumes and send that photo as a postcard to all of your friends and family. Also, there’s nothing weird about you seeming to always post pictures with your cat doing cute things or talking for hours about how clever it is and what new tricks it’s learned!
20. Telling the truth
We no longer care that much if someone thinks we are “rude” or “unkind” when expressing our opinions and telling people what we really think. We are too tired of pretending to be “okay” when things are bad and can usually just spill everything out to our close friends without being ashamed.
Also, by our late 20s, we’ve come to realize that we cannot change who we are or change the people around us. But we can always let them go and get rid of any toxic relationships that spoil our lives.
