For about 6 months now I have been that fun, legal age of 21. I finally hit the mark. All of the buildup, all of the waiting, the fake I.D.'s being denied, the stress of having it taken, the drama of who was going to use who's, and the worry of being left behind when everyone's works except for yours, just went poof.

And what is all this stress for?

With the legal drinking age being 21 years old there is an extreme gap in the timeline of a teenager/young adults social life. From high school into college the transition of growing up and finding who you are in society is, more often than not, involving alcohol - no matter how legal it may be. By sophomore year of high school it was much too easy for my friends and I to somehow get our hands on a handle of vodka and some beers. We had no idea what we were doing, we had no idea what our limits were, but we experimented. Even at this age, sneaking shots in our parents basements with CapriSuns as chasers, and walking blocks in the dead of night to hide the remnants in the woods somewhere, alcohol was a part of that journey. It's a part of growing up.

We discovered our limits, realized what we may like and what we didn't like, and we built memories off of those random nights. Some were definitely better than others, a decent amount were complete disasters. But without that journey I never would have come into college with the knowledge and level of comfort which I had.

So what is it about alcohol that has pushed the drinking age up to 21? The fear, obviously, of harm. The danger of using a drug, and even more so, overusing that drug. Alcohol can completely alter your mentality, emotions and so much more, especially when used incorrectly. Now I am not here to preach to the choir about the importance of alcohol education and what qualifies as a true "one drink" measurement. I have had my fair share of "too drunk" fun nights out where I certainly pushed the limits. However, I have found that since turning 21 there has been a good deal less of that in comparison to how much alcohol I have consumed.

In Europe the legal drinking age is 18, with a few countries even pushing it down to 16. In reality though this "legal age" means nothing. After travelling to Paris with my parents at the ripe age of 16, being offered a glass of wine and kindly saying no (since I was definitely not legal), the watier asked me how old I was, to which I shyly responded "only sixteen". At this exact moment, in any restaurant in the United States, my empty wine glass would have been swiftly snatched and whisked away from my seat at the table. Because of course merely seeing that empty wine glass in front of me would be breaking underage drinking laws.

As I found out for myself at the age of 16, and noticed immediately upon my return at the age of 20, European society sees alcohol and drinking with a completely different set of goggles (and I'm not talking about beer goggles). Alcohol is a key part of society, the center of many interactions and nights out for entertainment. More so than not during my time studying abroad when I went out and consumed alcohol it was not a night of binge drinking and rowdiness. Rather I would go out with friends simply to enjoy one another's company, have a glass of wine or 2, and hang out.

Being legal means having the ability to go anywhere, buy anything, and actually enjoy the act of drinking rather than simply using it for the after effects has a way of changing your mindset. This in turn makes people drink less, as their desperation to obtain and use alcohol disappears. When you consume alcohol for pleasure rather than "liquid courage" you take your time, live in the moment and act of being social, and savor the natural entertainment that comes once your social circle begins to feel the effects. This feeling, however, is one that is much less likely to give you a headache the next morning. This is the way alcohol should be consumed, and I fully believe would be much more often, if the legal drinking age was returned to 18 years old.