On Feeling 15 Again

I’m at my parents’ house for a week of family vacation. Even though I will shortly enter the last year of my early 30s (otherwise known as my ‘late early 30s’), whenever I come home for more than three days I feel the mental pressures of being about 15. Even though this house has been transformed in the past few years by huge amounts of renovation and work, it’s still the house in which I grew up. Even though my mom took me out to dinner last night and we had great food and I had a whiskey sour, part of me still feels like an adolescent. It is seemingly unavoidable.

So this morning my sister had yet to arrive and my mom was at her office catching up on some stuff. I decided to spend my time organizing things, figuring out what I’m going to take back west with me, etc. Because it was fairly hot on our second floor, and because I was carrying boxes and such, I decided to take off my shirt. Then I decided it would be more fun to do this work in my underwear. Then I decided it would be even more fun to do this work, instead of sporting the trunk-cut boxer-briefs I put on this morning, in a jock strap.

What prompted this? Well initially, as I said, it was very warm. Then when I had the idea to just do the underwear thing, it was me feeling like I wanted to do something ‘a bit naughty,’ which had a very slight risk of getting caught. Then, with the jock, I figured, what the hell, if I’m going to be ‘a bit naughty’ then I might as well be ‘a lot naughty.’ I like being naked or mostly naked, and as soon as I move back to the Leftist Coast I will have very few opportunities outside of my small room. So, I figured, why the hell not. Also it lets me feel submissive, which is cool. But mostly, I will admit, it was the 15 year old in me wanting to act out a bit.

Since I am fairly comfortable and confident in my mental health as a person who now fully qualifies as an “adult” or “grown up,” I like the fact that I can own this and have fun with it. I believe the term is “regressive pull” in the context of working with children and youth. I definitely feel “regressive pull” when I spend time at the ‘rents house. Who doesn’t like to be naughty on occasion?