If there’s one thing I hate to admit, it’s that I can’t seem to quit MySpace. Believe me, I would really love to. Think of all the homework I could actually finish and the real friendships I could actually have if I just avoided obsessively chasing random links through the Internet’s endless black holes. And to discover what? That most people don’t know how to spell? Or, as I delightfully stumbled upon today, that there are a plethora of 40-plus females in Minneapolis still wearing face glitter?

I mention this because the other day a friend and I were surfing the Internet for fun – and yes, I admit, for our fix of Kelly Clarkson and Caturday – when somehow we came across pure GOLD. From what we could glean from her Myspace, “Miss Lisa” is 36 with a teenage son (whom she calls “her lil’ hustla”) and an awesome binge-drinking record. Now, I’m used to coming across the occasional profile with an expansive banner collection screaming “Sexy Beotch” and “Baybee Gurl” in pink sparkles but I thought that ended when the period began?

Why pretend? Some people – the ones that we don’t let come out with us after a certain age – are blessed with the elastic skin of Gumby, and therefore will look 13 forever. Let’s honor them. And then there are the rest of us, the people that age normally. Seeing that this is a trend that affects, I don’t know, EVERYONE, you would think that we would be a little more accepting of the evolution our body takes.

I might be speaking from a somewhat limited perspective, but this sad – and bless us, comical – regression seems to be a largely American phenomenon. Feel free to prove me wrong, but before you do, take a look at the evidence with me, for I can’t be on the Internet for five minutes before I stumble across one of my friend’s mothers posturing as “sexxxibunnie41” on Facebook. Excuse me, but it seems like the adults in any other country have better things to do than sit on MySpace pretending that their extra small camisole looks sexy not horrifying.

My question is: WHY!? I’m so excited to be able to live out the stereotypes of each decade that I’ve already pinned down exactly what I’m going to wear, down to my pantyhose. What’s so wrong with getting old? I mean yeah, I’m a little scared of my teeth falling out, but I can’t wait to be 40. Holy crap – a chance to bitch about my lame next-door neighbors? Finally having a reason for that Good Housekeeping subscription? Yes Please! Where is my time machine?

That said, nothing grosses me out more than people who simply, for the literal life of them, can’t accept their age as a fact. Hey, I might only be 21 but I’ve read enough bad literature in my life to know that the odds are against me and that there probably will come a time in my life when I feel the aching yearn to start hitting on my teenage son’s friends, or – if you’re like my dad – splurging on zebra print seat covers for my minivan. But why not embrace it?

Kat Hargreaves welcomes comments at [email protected].