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Roll over and hit the home button on my iPhone. No notifications? Whatever. Enter passcode and open Instagram to see if the photo of that inspirational quote I posted before I went to bed hit at least 20% of my followers. Nope. 12 likes. Resolve that the next photo must be a surefire hit: my cat or a selfie. Correction: selfie with too much makeup. Scroll Instagram and like the first five photos I see.

Hit my inbox next. Eight new emails? Holy moly, Ms. Popular. Oh. Nevermind. Six are from Screenwriting Blogs and Festivals I subscribe to and two are UGG outlet spam emails that I can’t for the life of me stop receiving. Check junk to see if anything important accidentally got filtered there. Just an Urban Outfitters sale notification. By no means junk but I hide it there as a means of wallet preservation. Next up is Facebook messenger. I scroll through a muted work thread and find nothing important but feel a twinge of satisfaction by being kept in the loop in little spurts of my choosing.

Last is Facebook. Notifications include a casting notice for a non-union project seeking “really funny comedian-caliber models who are real people, relatable, but with an edgy style.” I then spend a few minutes staring at my headshots wondering which one meets the breakdown. The answer? None. But I send one anyway. I spend more time than I’d like to admit scrolling through my newsfeed watching videos posted by a mixture of my Aunt, coworkers past and present, and some guys I’m pretty sure I never met.

Productivity: zero. Self-worth: low. Addiction: all time high.

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The other day I had to speak to a Lawyer and after I was done adulting, my first impulse was to suck my thumb to restore balance. Yes, on paper I am thirty years old, but inside I’m not a day over sixteen. And I’m not talking maturity, although I do still laugh when people fart. It’s more of a feeling and the more people I talk to about it, the more I realize that that feeling never really goes away.

There isn’t a more perfect example of this feeling then when I purchase alcohol. I prescreen the LCBO cashiers in an attempt to decide which one is least likely to I.D. me. Again, I’m 30. After I’ve chosen my preferred cashier, I hop in line and vibrate with anxiety. The next defensive technique I adopted is having my Air Miles card at the ready, because what underage kid would have an Air Miles card? I end up so consumed with not getting carded that my face reads suspicious bitch despite the laugh lines and greys. I avoid eye contact, reply no thanks when the cashier asks me how I am and slide my ever-ready Air Miles card into the debit machine.

“I.D. please”

Damnit. I present my I.D. and stand worried that the layers of make-up I applied in an effort to have a nice Driver’s License photo have now made me unrecognizable in person.

“Thank you.”

Oh thank god. My body releases pounds of tension and I strut seemingly weightless out of the store. I run home as if I got away with murder. Once in my apartment, I crack open the bottle of wine, pour a glass and draw a bath. I soak away all the aches and pains of getting older while I text my best friend, “you’ll never guess what happened today, I got fuckin’ carded! Still got it!”

I most certainly DO NOT still got it.