Coming+of+Age+2-1-2011

Coming of Age “My daughter’s a woman,” Rufus Humphrey said, looking at his gorgeous blond fourteen-year-old daughter with wonder. She blushed and gave a little titter, looking downwards. This scene is from the television series //Gossip Girl// which takes its viewers to a fictional Upper East Side in New York City. Coming from old money, the teenagers and their families are all attractive and classily dressed, overflowing with wealth and drama. The show portrays many of the main teenage characters physically to be men and women, not the typical teenage girls and boys. But are the characters really, truly mentally men and women? Everyone has their own definition of the words “man” and “woman,” their own perceptions of when each person crosses over to adulthood. To me, the definitions of “man” and “woman” contain the traits of what makes a person an “adult.” The aspects of one’s personality hat I consider to be adult are generally the same for both men or women: they are mental and emotional characteristics. To truly become an adult is to have responsibility. Responsibility is a vague term that carries within it the qualities of respect, kindness, the ability to be financially independent, and to have courage to stand by their promises and words. Perhaps age does not matter, but (forgive my generalizing) with age usually comes experience, although there are certainly exceptions. Thus for someone to be a man or woman, to me they are usually over the age of seventeen, a time when they have generally gone through the awkward post-puberty stage. Physically, their bodies are more developed and their minds have potentially gone through more challenging experiences that have helped to shape the person they are to become. Again, the expectation of the minute details that are necessary to consider people an “adult” is a personal interpretation, and I believe that I have not become a woman yet. In the //Harry Potter// series, a witch or wizard comes of age at seventeen, Although I myself am seventeen, I definitely do not have the characteristics of a woman. I think that I may be close to becoming a woman in a few years. I understand the importance of mutual respect, financial capability and emotional and intellectual maturity. After experiencing many person events, going away to summer camps and traveling alone, I think I that I have a little bit of the maturity that someone needs to become a woman; to understand that I need to have the capability ro be financially independent, to treat everyone with respect and dignity, to be kind to people and to be able to take responsibility for my actions and words. I think that adults work hard for what they have, and I also think that I really want to achieve my goals and have begun to understand that I must work hard for what I want while continuing to have the characteristics of a woman to really become an adult. I must pay for my college education myself, and I still do not understand the great financial difficulty this will cause for me. Thus, hopefully after a few years in college I will become a woman, as I will have had time to practice and learn more about both emotional and fiscal responsibility. I could list names of women I admire: Michelle Rhee, J.K Rowling, and Amy Chua, to name a few. It is their actions that entail the qualities that they have that I respect: they are all intelligent, independent, capable women who are unafraid to speak their opinions. Michelle Thee became one of the most hated women in the District of Columbia after shutting down twenty-three inefficient public schools, but she stated that she did not care if people hated her, and that she only wanted to do what was right (which was to improve the D.C public school system, ranked the worst in the country). I hope to become as fearless, respectful, and intelligent as the women I admire, and hope I became respectful of others and myself, kind, understanding, intelligent, emotionally mature and fiscally responsible, I will have become a woman.

Coming of Age Reflection