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When I was 22...

When I was 22 I wore half tops.
When I was 22 I got so hammered at a party that I walked through a screen door.
When I was 22 I did Ecstasy a bunch.
When I was 22 I would drink and drive a bunch.
When I was 22 I thought my tits were the best things about me.
When I was 22 I would talk shit about all of my friends behind their backs.
When I was 22 I would smoke cigarettes.
When I was 22 I showed up to an interview drunk.
When I was 22 I thought blow jobs were "fun".
When I was 22 I would do cocaine.
When I was 22 I shaved off all my pubes.
When I was 22 I would go a tanning salon.
When I was 22 I thought I didn't have to pay my bills.
When I was 22 I would have road rage.
When I was 22 I had a tongue ring.
When I was 22 I thought 30 was old AF.
When I was 22 I had to move back in with my parents.
When I was 22 I was in a cover band.

When I was 22, I was an asshole. I made stupid decisions, said stupid things and behaved stupidly basically every day of my life. Was it because I was a bad person? No, of course not. It was because I was twenty-fucking-two and you're the biggest dummy on the planet at that age. Everyone is, no exceptions.

There is a woman who was recently cast on SNL, and is being attacked on social media for some dumb ass tweets she tweeted when she was 22. She's 28 now, and six years makes a big difference. The person who outed her for these tweets (which BTW she was in the process of deleting probably because she thought, shit, these are stupid I should get rid of these) is another woman. This woman, a "social justice" reporter, went out of her way to find these tweets from years ago, screen shot them, and post them all over the Internet. She chastised the SNL cast member, claiming that she was really excited for this woman to be on the show because she is the first Latina woman cast in several years, then proceeded to shame her publicly because she believed that the content of those old tweets were racist, igniting a social media shit storm which could potentially really hurt this woman's career. All in the name of "social justice".

Look, I don't want to comment about whether or not I think these tweets were racist. That's not what this post is about. This post is about keeping in mind that when you were 22, you too were a very stupid person and did very stupid things. If you think you didn't do anything stupid at 22, you're wrong you did so stop lying to yourself.  Thank God there wasn't Twitter when I was 22 because I don't resemble that person today at all!

I invite all of you to take a moment and jot down a couple of memories from when you were 22, particularly the ones that make you cringe. Go ahead, I'll wait.

Got some? How do you feel? Embarrassed? Silly? Like you were a fucking idiot back then and thank God you survived to make it where you are today? Yup, me too. That list at the top is just the tip of the iceberg of what a nightmare I was, and I'm too scared to write the worst ones down. But if I ever get some big break and someone went out of their way to dredge up some of my past behaviors after I've worked so hard, it would be horrible, but it probably wouldn't be hard to dig up some dirt because again, I have done some shameful shit!

Point is we're all flawed and have done things we are ashamed of and are grateful to have moved past. There is nothing we can do about the past, but maybe from now on we have the choice to be kinder, raise our girls to celebrate and support each other, and always do your best. Like, truly, really your best.

And for the love of God, get off of Twitter! It's ruining our lives!!!!

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