Of the paradox of getting older

ageing does bring confidence and a growing sense of self and certain rash what the hell, but, oddly at the exact same time, I may feel Absolutely no different when I were 17, I understand, in the good logical part of my mind, that this is not precisely the case.
I really do know more than what I did 10 years ago, I can sit down and make a detailed list of all the things I know now, its literally so, but there are times when it doesn't feel so.
The powerful irrational part of my brain is urgently telegraphing that all those things I've learnt are somehow irrelevant, or are no more than figments, or count for nothing: the truth is that I am just still feeling like a teenager who is masquerading as a grown up.
I do believe that the defining feature of humanbeings is their bizarre ability to hold two opposing ideas at once.
The aspect of ageing is a perfect example.
I know I am gaining knowledge and wisdom and savvy and all those good things, I have the scars to show for it, because I have learnt the hard way (I wonder if there's any other way ! Does anyone ever say I learnt the easy way?!)
I have a perfect pension fund of emotional and practical experience, ready to be drawn on.
Yet there are moments when all this count for nothing and I find myself at a loss, convinced that the growing up police or something are about to tap me on the shoulder and say I am busted

I wonder whether this is because somewhere along the line, someone in a book or a movie or even IRL laid down a template of what an adult should look like! If I don't fulfil this picture in every aspect I must feel I can not be the real thing.
I hope vainly that I can go on perpetuating the illusion, I pray that everyone else is so preoccupied with their own mad simulacrum of adulthood that they won't notice the paper thin aspect of my own counterfeit.
The only way I see around this paradox is to accept it.
Some days I feel really old indeed, that I only fit for reading the columns and pondering my pension, on other days I am filled with youthful folly and want to go put glitter in my nails and eat jello for breakfast.
Age is mostly a state of mind, and I know for sure that my mind is fervid and unpredictable, there's no perfect template for being a grown up, no secret prescription written down somewhere of how I should feel or behave or even be.
So I'm embracing all my scattered inner selves, and won't bow to any misguided imperative.