How old am I? Seventeen. How long have I been seventeen? About 25 days...

Oh, I know what I am.
I am the teenager who has senior exams. I am the teenager soon to be on her P's. I am that 5"3 ginger kid who is nearly 20 years old. I am the girl who is about to be released from school and enter the world outside.
BRILLIANT!!! Or is it? The independent and almost entirely grown up lifestyle is chill. But there is one thing that really grasps my goat.

Those awful stares the elder people give you.
The harassment from those who are scared of anything under 21 years of age. Now, I do agree, youth can be a scary thing. But is it so scary that the elder have to cast out two boys from "their shopping centre", just because these boys are holding skateboards? It is almost as if moving at a slightly quicker pace than walking is an offense!
Is it so scary that when you pick up a sponge in K Mart, one should emerge from within the toy aisle and drop the verbal bomb?

"Either buy that, or put it right back where it came from!!"

These adults... they can be very scary at the best of times! I can understand how paranoia may arise from a past encounter with a real thuggish 15-year-old, but is it really that difficult to tell the difference between those who want to just look at the sponge, and those who want to pee on it and hurl it across K Mart into the gardening appliances section where, should the thrower be lucky, land on the bald head of a fern connoisseur?

I think the elders should consider before throwing the punches.