Blimey, today’s prompt is asking a lot of me. To think back that long ago requires a superhuman feat of memory, but I’ll give it a go. When was the first time I felt grown up? I have no idea. I remember as a young teenager, me and my mate Mark hanging around the streets with nothing much to do, talking about girls and what it would be like when we got older. We were both very silly and used to fall about laughing saying we really had to grow up and be mature or we’d never get ‘fixed up’. I think it took me a long time to grow up, because I was always getting told by girls I was too immature. 

I certainly felt a little grown up when, at the age of thirteen, I went ‘tatey picking’ with my mate on a local farm and earned my first wage: one pound. I was so thrilled I ironed it when I got home because it had got creased in my pocket. 

I felt a little more grown up when I went into a pub with my Dad for my first pint, aged eighteen. I asked for a half, which he was outraged by and told me in no uncertain terms that only ‘puffs’ drank halves. I changed my order to a shandy, which was again met with the same incredulity. I was given a pint of lager which I didn’t want, so I sneaked back to the barmaid and asked her to put some lime cordial in it. We sat in the pub in silence, with nothing to say to each other.

Having sex for the first time made me feel a little more grown up, however I was clearly terrible at it, and it was a completely unenjoyable occasion. I wish I could say my technique improved as I got older, but alas that would be lying. They say you should be a lover or a fighter, but I wasn’t either. 😂

Perhaps I felt grown up when I left home. My mate had a flat and I moved my stuff into his spare room. I don’t remember feeling especially mature though, just lonely and empty, like I’d lost a home not gained a new one. 

Or how about when I turned twenty-one? That is a rite of passage for manhood isn’t it? I was working with a group of guys on a building site about a hundred miles from home. We went to a local bar and they showered me with alcoholic drinks. So much so, that I was intoxicated within the first hour. I collapsed drunk and had to be taken home early. I can’t say my overwhelming feeling the next morning was being grown up. 🤢

Maybe it was when I got married. Yes, I felt grown up then. I felt like I’d just made the biggest mistake of my life, which has a way of sobering you up. My first marriage was a non-stop battleground. We fought and argued for the next fifteen years and caused each other, our families and our children, so much emotional and financial turmoil. God I sound miserable! 😂

But to be honest, my most positive memories of being grown up, were on the days my two children were born. Looking onto their sweet, beautiful, angelic faces for the first time, that made me feel like a man. I’ve been creative my whole life, but they are my greatest creation. I knew in that moment that I would pour heart and soul into their upbringing, that I would give them my last breath. Not all men get to be fathers, but in my case, being grown up, becoming a man, was when I became a Dad. It is my greatest achievement and I’m so very proud of them both.