When Did We Become Adults?

Perhaps this seems like a strange, rather profound question to be tossing out there on a Monday night. However, I assure you, there is a reason for it.
I was cleaning out my office tonight. The closet has needed the attention for quite awhile. And I ran across an old shoebox full of random stuff, carted around in all the moves. Inside this shoebox was pictures, letters, and other random stuff from my past. Pictures dating all the way back to grade school years, but most of high school and college. Letters that my friends had wrote me along the way. Cards that people had sent me. I, in my ever present quest to declutter, began to go through them, one by one. Reading each and every one of them. Took me forever.
I had several from an old high school friend. About our troubles as high school students. How this boy would never notice her. How it made me crazy to hear about it constantly, mainly because he was a friend of mine. (can't go it more, the innocent may read :) How hard and painful our lives were. The pictures of the proms, and birthdays, and all the cards from each other. How the whole world didn't understand our dilemma. How could we ever survive?
Well, I know it was very real at the time. And very painful. But I've discovered something. Pain is relative. Sorrow is subjective. And heartache is situational. But so, too, is love.
Sometimes I wish for problems to be as simple as they were. How did I blink and time flew by so fast? When did I go from getting ready for dances to getting ready for dance? When did staying up half the night involve children? And when did it become so important to get the latest Mickey Mouse Clubhouse movie, instead of the latest clothes?

Dear self from 10 years ago,
This current situation you are in may be hard, and you may be hurting. But get ready. You haven't experienced anything yet. True heartache is coming. True love is coming. While this situation, this moment, seems heartbreaking, the truth is that things in your life will break your heart more than this ever could. You will love more than you ever thought possible. And you will discover something far more important. You will discover that what causes you the greatest joy will also break your heart more times than you can count. You will know what it is like to love so much that you would give your life for them.
In a few short years, you will look back on this moment, and realize that the best things in life are not behind you, but ahead of you. The people that matter the most are some of the people you don't yet know. And the most beautiful things on earth, the best part of your heart, isn't even born yet.
But in 10 years, read these letters, smile, and find those friends back. See what they are up to. How life is treating them. Because chances are, none of you will even care about these days anymore. You will all be moving ahead, moving forward, and loving life even more.
Love your older, wiser self

PS: And when you look back on those pictures, remember, that skinny chick had never had babies, and did not live on bunny macaroni. So yeah, she did look like that, once.