Mature at Last

Mature
Main Entry: 1ma·ture
Pronunciation: m&-'tur, -'tyur also -'chur
Function: adjective
Inflected Form(s): ma·tur·er; -est
Etymology: Middle English, from Latin maturus ripe; akin to Latin mane in the morning, manus good
1 : based on slow careful consideration, "a mature judgment"
2 a (1) : having completed natural growth and development :
[thanks to www.m-w.com for the official definition]

My definition:
Mature
The process that occurs in life when deeply-held, dear beliefs are blown to shit.

For example:
There is no Santa Claus.
How can this BE? Santa Claus is all that is good about childhood. Santa Claus rewards (or doesn't) simply because you're... YOU! He's a great guy, right? Never asks for thank-you notes, settles for milk and cookies, leaves you a ton of cool stuff you KNOW your family can't afford... Then some fool tells you he doesn't even exist. Thanks for nothin'. Asshole.

There is no Tooth Fairy.
Figures. Stupid cow probably ran off with Santa Claus. I'm keepin' my fuckin' teeth to myself from now on.

You are not special.
This is the real kicker. One day you realize that all that agonizing during your youth was just so much wasted, delusional time.

You weren't born for some incredible mysterious "purpose." You're not here to fulfill a dream, a promise, or a prophecy... You are as much a random collection of matter and energy as a pebble or a fruit-fly, and no more meaningful than either. The time you spent wondering when your destiny would arrive would just as well have been spent watching television or banging your head against walls.

And this, I think, is when you can call yourself "mature." When you've allowed yourself to let go the last few shreds of hope that you'd ever amount to a fucking thing or ever had a purpose of any kind... then you've finally matured.