After I turned 18, I thought everything was going to be different. "I'm an adult, now," I thought, "no more being treated like a kid."

Looking back on this, I should've known better.

While I wasn't considered a kid anymore, I certainly wasn't considered an adult, either. I was put in this weird, in-between place that I will now live in for another year until I turn 21.

You can't do anything new after 18 and before 21.

At age 20, I can still do all the things I could do at 18. I can vote, buy a pack of cigarettes if I truly desired, play the lottery, serve my country, be out after curfew, but I still won't be treated like anything other than an overgrown teenager by those who have apparently reached "real adulthood."

I'd like to know just when, exactly, does one reach that age?

Is it 30? 40? Or maybe it's 50?

Does it depend on experience? What if I experience more of life than someone at 40 by the time I'm 26? Does that bump me up? Do I get treated as a full-fledged adult then?

But here's the worst part of it all: Do I really even want that?

Do I want to be put in charge of things? Do I want to pay all my bills? Do I truly want to enter the magical world of adulthood?

On one hand, I do. It's something I've been looking forward to my whole life. I can do whatever I want (within reason), I can set my own goals, I can control my own life.

On the other hand, setting my own goals, when I don't even fully know them yet, can be difficult. Doing whatever I want can be reckless, and controlling my own life is going to take a serious amount of effort. I mean, I have finals I haven't studied for and papers due that I haven't even begun.

So maybe we have put ourselves in this in-between...

I mean, sure, adults have implanted and enforced it, but we've maintained it.

And although I have a great distaste for the way we are treated in this stage of life, and as much as I despise saying it, this might just be a necessary evil to prepare us for the future.

This is a time to discover ourselves, to find our goals, to work through the kinks of how we're going to achieve them, without having all the stress of being 30 years old with a career and 2.5 kids.

So, go! Find yourself, meet new people, eat weird things, travel to far away places and enjoy your time "in-between" because, according to all the Facebook statuses I see, we're going to miss it when it's gone.