28 things that, at the age of 28, I am still yet to master

For anyone who doesn’t follow me on Instagram and therefore didn’t have the pleasure of seeing me make a big song and dance about it, it was my birthday at the weekend. I turned 28.

This is the blog post that would have gone up on my birthday/the day after if I wasn’t too busy eating cake (my bad), although I’m going to be 28 for the whole year now so I guess it’s no big deal.

I’ve read lots of lovely ‘XX life lessons’ or ‘XX things I’ve learnt in XX years’ posts when people have turned a given age before, but owing to the fact that I’m not very wise, and also not very good at convincingly delivering ‘inspo’, I thought I’d better take a different tack. This will therefore be 28 things that I am still not capable of, even at the grand old age of 28.

When I was younger, there were lots of things I oh-so-stupidly assumed I’d have sorted by my late twenties; I’d own a home, be married, be a roaring success in my chosen field of work and probably have three terrible children. We all know about that though, don’t we, because we like discussing that it’s okay, we’re all on our own journey, etc etc (Firstly, we absolutely should continue talking about that and I expect I will write about that and some point, and secondly – see? Terribly unconvincing at delivering ‘inspo’). I’m not going to focus on those big life milestones though; no no, this will be all the little things that I just assumed I would one day grow out of being crap at and learn how to do like a real life competent adult.

Turns out that’s rubbish, because they’re all mind-numblingly simple and I still. Cannot. Master. Them.

Side note – I assure you, this isn’t a desperate attempt to convince myself I’m actually SO young, because I don’t really have any negative feelings about my age at all. Here are 28 things that, at the age of 28, I am still incapable of:

1) Undoing my shoelaces before taking them off. Cursing me-from-the-day-before every single time I try to leave the house in a rush.

2) Speaking of which: leaving anything other than the bare minimum amount of time it could conceivably take me to get to my desired destination, and subsequently power walking there with such aggression that I give myself something that feels like shin splints.

3) Taking the recycling out, no matter how large the pile has gotten. I think I’ve done this of my own accord a grand total of once, and it’s really annoying.

4) Tasting wine in a restaurant. A painful ordeal for all involved when I’m there being awkward as hell; please just pour it, I’m convinced its going to taste like wine.

5) Answering that awkward ‘y’alright?’ when you walk past someone you know in an acceptable manner. What is an acceptable manner, please? Is it a question? Am I supposed to be saying ‘oh yes fine thank you, how about you?’? Or is it basically ‘hello’ – and if it is, why don’t they just say that?

6) Parallel parking. I thought this was something that I’d just naturally get better at (and certainly expected to have mastered 6 years after my driving test), but alas that’s not the case.

7) Taking a compliment. I might do my fair share of ‘thanks gal!’ on Instagram, but you should SEE me squirm while trying to deal with a compliment in real life.

8) Executing an effective weekly shop. The ‘weekly shops’ Rob and I do always seem to run out on a Thursday (and we generally do it on Sunday), we pick things up throughout the week too and we seem to spend quite a lot of money for stuff to last only four days. It’s a mystery.

9) Winged eyeliner (and the real kicker here is that nowadays 13 year olds can do this amazingly).

10) Making small talk. Most notably with taxi drivers, people in shops, people at work who I don’t know; I can’t even attempt this, and I’m a very awkward participant when anyone tries to start it with me.

11) Saving money; I once saved enough to be unemployed and travel for 6 months and now I probably need to save for grown up ‘future’ things I struggle to save anything at all. Interesting, but also a bit worrying.

12) Going to bed at a reasonable hour; I have an awful habit of staying up until 1am under the pretence of ‘stuff to do’ but actually just panicking about not having done anything. I thought I would have managed to stop this by now – maybe by 29?

13) Taking the car to a garage by myself. Embarrassing admission: yes, aged TWENTY EIGHT, I still call my dad first every time there is a car related issue. Really appalling from someone who values independence so highly, I know…

14) Keeping on top of household chores. I’m not looking for a spotless showhome, but it would be nice if the ironing pile wasn’t a permanent feature and I assumed at one point I would be doing grown up life effectively enough for this to be the case.

15) Putting an appropriate number of items in/on bags/wardrobes/drawers/coat racks. If I can overstuff or overload something, I will, and then it breaks or collapses and I’m left full of regret at my own adulting failure.

16) Preventing myself from crying when I’m angry or frustrated. I was hoping this unfortunate trait would have disappeared by now, but I cried in anger just half an hour ago, so can confirm it’s still alive and well.

17) Spending more than £25 on a top without feeling like I’m being robbed. At two years away from 30 I feel I should have more grown up shopping habits.

18) Speaking of which; going into Primark or New Look without buying way more items than I went in for (and the total at the till being way more than that £25 top limit I mentioned in number 17…).

19) Making phone calls; still waiting for the dose of maturity which will stop me feeling a sense of impending doom when I have to pick up the phone.

20) Opening a share bag of crisps without eating the lot. I don’t know how people can have a handful then put them away, but that’s some really good self-control and I need some.

21) Saying no. I still have an awful habit of saying yes to every plan anyone ever tries to make with me, so often end up running between a few different things in a day and subsequently not enjoying any of them – it also leaves me feeling frazzled. You’d think a 28 year old would be capable of saying the simple phrase ‘I’m afraid I won’t be able to’, wouldn’t you?

22) Completing a task without moving on to other. I get so panicked by the look of my to do list sometimes that I struggle to finish one task and move on to the next; instead I flit about half completing a few of them and nothing gets done.

23) Looking after my possessions. I don’t think I’ve gone a day without losing something in several months now.

24) Behaving in a non-awkward way around children. I’m sorry, but I don’t understand kids and they don’t understand me, and I’m awkward anyway but I’m awkward times a million when babies and children are there.

25) Relaxing. I like to loudly proclaim how I love baths and early nights and doing nothing on the sofa, and I do, but I never actually do them.

26) Buying clothes that actually fit me. I spoke about this here, but I’m still so enticed by things that I love that whether it’s comfortable or fits well sometimes gets pushed by the wayside. Case in point; these culottes. BUT GINGHAM.

27) Viewing my bank balance (and I mean basically ever). This really does need to change, because to rectify the savings situation I probably have to know how much money I have in the first place…

28) Taking a moment to recognise all that I have mastered, because I might be a crisp-scoffing, phone-avoiding parking failure, but I still seem to be a basically functioning adult, so it’s probably fine.

What I’m wearing

Trousers – Zara | Top – New Look| Wedges – C/O Dorothy Perkins| Bag – Topshop | Earrings – C/O Lisa Angel (Use code SOPHARSOGOOD15 for 15% off until the end of June)| Sunglasses – Primark

Photography: Robert Poor

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