Is This It?

There is a song by Colin Hay called ""Waiting for My Real Life to Begin". I've been using it as my anthem for about two years now, ever since I heard it on Scrubs. It's got a quiet, melodic angst that fits (that part of?) my personality pretty well. But it's also hopeful in the fact that there's bound to be something else about to happen...right?
But lately, I have begun to realize that it is happening. Or, at least, life is happening and that I am left to absorb it and make it my 'real life'. College is this weird, womb-like incubator that gives the illusion of responsibility but all the security of your D-1-emblazoned fleece blanket to curl up in when necessary. Grad School probably isn't that much different, but it is different when it's happening in New York City, when most of the people I left behind in Alabama aren't there anymore, when the ones that are there are also beginning something of their own that is equally new and big and real.
In every circle that I travel in, and there are a few, there seems to be one common theme this Fall...upheaval. Normally, I cannot compare any of these groups in any way except to say that I am friends with the people who comprise them and they each offer me something that is significantly different than the rest-- generally intangible but not always indescribable-- and, certainly, greatly appreciated. (When I say they are different, I mean I can't even complain to someone from one about someone from the other because the two people share so little in common that the story leaves me defending the person I was complaining about to begin with because the other person can't really even begin to understand how said situation arose and, sometimes, how I even allowed myself to become so enmeshed in that relationship/circumstance to begin with. But those are different stories for different times...)
Right now, though, it seems that we all share things in common with the most unlikely of our counterparts/contemporaries. While we can recognize the shift in dynamics, it is sometimes hard to recognize the signs of common struggle, especially through the distance that has suddenly become non-metaphorical.
It's going to be interesting to see how everything unfolds. While it's sometimes scary to imagine gaping drifts between me and the family I've chosen, there's some comfort in the fact that I am not the only one figuring things out right now. I get to watch the people I admire most face the same dificulties that I am facing, rather than envying them an easier lot than the self-imposed burdens I'm prone to allotting for myself. It's also comforting to know that, although it would seem that I am alone on the tight rope in a city of 8 million other people, I have a net that is expanding across the nation. And the knots are all much more secure than my own: 2 lawyers with 3 more in-training, a med student, a social worker, a brain child/entrepreneur, urban planners, a tax specialists, MBAs, workers at NGOs, an IT specialist, a banker, a journalist, and a few people brave enough to join the Marines, Air Force and Army.
So, if this is it, I think it's going to be OK. And if it's not, then I guess I've got to get ready for the next big thing. But first, I've got to get some coffee and work on my midterms before I go to class tonight. As much as I want to put myself on the same track as my friends, I'm usually pretty glad that I'm not an adult yet and that I can spend the morning at Brooklyn Bridge Park talking to strangers about my dog and drinking coffee while i think about how everyone else is doing.