I’ve been running around telling everyone I’m an adult — I turned 20 last week. Some of my friends have been quick to correct me. I know you’re still “underage” until you turn 21, but I am in the vicinity of adulting. Because I love to exaggerate things, I have also been complaining about this take on entering adulthood.

In theory, I know this isn’t true adulthood, but it feels like I’m there.

You start your 20s when you turn 20. Everyone’s saying they don’t start until you’re like 24, but at the end of the day, mathematically, I am in a new decade of my life right now. And don’t worry. this won’t be a column on numbers — I’m not a math fan, sadly. Numbers will be common just this one time (hopefully), as I rant on the powers of significant numbers like 20.

I’ve been obsessed with the fact that I really can’t say I’m just a teenage girl now. My teens are done, so this excuse is out the window for me. I shouldn’t need a reason to justify things like crying to TikTok edits of Jim waiting for Pam. Yet here I am, still caring and too invested in the smallest things in life — I know I am just as lost as when I was 19.

In my 20s, I am supposed to get a job. I’m supposed to find something I love doing. I’m supposed to feel like I have a plan and a path —  I don’t.

In fact, I am still happily considering switching majors. I don’t know if I will be working a corporate job, be a writer or work a random niche profession.

At 20, I am supposed to be stronger — ideally confident enough to start thinking about law school. I am not even keeping law school at the back of my mind. For now, I’ve chosen liberty and peace of mind.

See, the issue with adulting is that things get real. As you get older, the world can start to feel like it’s closing in on you. When I arrived on campus last year, I realized my classes, grades, extracurriculars — all of it — mattered since day one for law school.

I am starting to see there’s so much I didn’t imagine at the start of my last decade. At 10, I wanted to be a lawyer — I can’t really say I would be a good lawyer now.

I was supposed to have traveled the world by now. Although I still have much to explore, this is a goal I am happy to hold onto for longer.

My dreams didn’t end with moving into my college dorm or turning 20. I’m in my sixth dorm room now. Decorating them and having my parents move me in has been fun, but it’s been the joy I’ve found in surviving my anxiety and the unknowns that has been the best. Maybe I’m ok at adulting.

So I’m rebranding my 20s from being my time of pulling my life together to my time to pull the string and unravel it all.

Because there will come a time when I will find myself behind a desk. I will not be fighting for a nine to five for the summer because I’ll have one year round. I will have bills under my name.

Things will change.

When I blow out my birthday candles, I make a wish. Each year, my wish is different because each stage of my life is supposed to bring me something new. While I could start preparing for these changes following college, I prefer to focus on things like the people that stood beside me as I blew out my candles starting with a two.

What I dreamt of at 10 is no longer exciting, and I will find something new to dream of at 20. But for now, this is worth dreaming about. What I have right now is worth forgetting about the future for a while longer.

I also will hopefully still find stability and knowledge later on. But this, like much in life, I’ve found out can be and probably will be overrated.

For now, I am rent free and enjoying all its perks.

Arlette Correa is a Medill sophomore and author of “Rent Free.” She can be contacted at [email protected]. If you would like to respond publicly to this op-ed, send a Letter to the Editor to [email protected]. The views expressed in this piece do not necessarily reflect the views of all staff members of The Daily Northwestern.