I Am Now Twice The Age Of A Freshman

Today I am twice the age of an incoming college freshman. My students are in trouble now, because age and treachery always trump youth and exuberance.¹

The scales are tilted even more in my favor than you might suppose. It’s not just that I’m twice their age — I’m far older in terms of adult experience. Let’s say that you begin experiencing the world as an adult at the age of 16 (ignore the howls of laughter you hear in the background). Then most freshmen have experienced life as a grown up for two years. I, on the other hand, have spent twenty years in that same state.

Twenty is ten times two. So although I am merely twice the biological age of freshmen, I am TEN TIMES as experienced at thinking like an adult. Advantage: me.

And if you think about it from a purely legal perspective, the freshmen have mere months of experience as an eighteen-year-old. I’ve been a legal adult for something like 50 times longer than them.

So there. Happy birthday to me.

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¹That’s sort of a quote. There are a lot of variants of it online.