Who Am I at 25

I've been thinking a lot about what I would, what I should, write for this. And the thing is, well, I haven't come up with much. Other than...

I'm okay. Here I am. 25. And I'm okay. Thrilling, right? Well, for me, it is. Okay is nothing short of utterly and completely thrilling. Because for so long I was not. Okay. And then I was not quite.

I have moments. All the time. Moments where I feel like I should have done more. Been more. Said more. Moments where I feel so far behind. I'm 25 already. This is it? This is all I've accomplished? But then I quietly remind myself that we all have different paths. Different life trajectories. Our stories vary. And my accomplishments, my multitudinous (yup, I just used that word) victories are mostly private. Things that others might never understand. But for me those victories are the difference between not okay. Not quite. And just fine.

And just fine, okay, whatever-you-want-to-call-it is the beginning. The beginning of everything. The part of my story where my successes become (i hope) a bit more public.

So who am I at 25?

I'm someone who believes that unsolicited smiles by strangers are one of the most profound acts of kindness possible.

I still use the pajamas that my mother gifted me for my 18th birthday. It immediately brings me back to a time of naivete and endless possibility.

The quote that makes the most sense to me right now, right at this very moment: Sometimes I can hear my bones straining under the weight of all the lives I'm not living  - Jonathan Safran Foer 

If I could go anywhere tomorrow I'd hop on a plane and land in Paris. Then I'd go to Rome. And sit in cafe after cafe after cafe. Saturating myself in beauty and history. And a lot of gelato. 

I'm engaged to an amazing man. I'm full of more love than I ever expected to be and I'm sure of him than I've ever felt about anything. 

I don't know where life goes from here. But I'm so excited to go boldly into the unknown. To try. and to fail a little, as inevitably I will. But also to start gathering successes. Collecting them one by one in the cradle of my arms so I can lay them on the alter of this life as my humble (and multitudinous) thanks.

I am so thankful to be 25. To be 25 and just fine.

Happy birthday to me. 

Perfect Backdrops

Past few days, the weather's erratic: rain one second, a brief intermission of blazing hot sun, and then it's raining again, and sunny again. And I try to be the sort of person whose mood isn't linked to the weather. But it's hard, you know? Sometimes it's hard not to let your environment affect you from the inside out. And this fitful weather, I must say, is just way too appropriate. 

This weather is probably more true-to-life than anything else. It's rare to find a day when you feel only sunny, or a day when melancholy is all you can muster. Most days are unpredictable. Inconsistent and unstable and entirely contradictory. Funny how exciting and difficult so often come hand-in-hand.

And yet. October showers have arrived. Rain is wonderful. Sometimes rain reminds me of some moments and places, days spent with my cats, evenings at a cafe laughing and swapping stories with friends. Sometimes rain helps me sleep. Or provides the perfect backdrop as I read or write. Or sets the mood for a melancholy, romantic kind of day.

Like anything else, it's not all bad and not all good either. But I'll take it as a good sign that for these days, I've woken up hours before my alarm, feeling light and lively. It's been nice. Really nice, actually. There's just nothing quite like first-thing-in-the-morning happiness, if you ask me.

Besides, the whole point of October showers is to cool down this heated earth and bring flowers and fruits, right? Something to endure, something to find beauty in before beauty's simply handed to us.

Words To Live By

The flower doesn't dream of the bee. It blossoms and the bee comes. | Mark Nepo, The Book of Awakening

If you have never changed your mind about some fundamental tenet of your belief, if you have never questioned the basics, and if you have no wish to do so, then you are likely ignorant. | Vera Nazarian

You can't keep the birds of sadness from flying over your head, but you can keep them from nesting in your hair. | Sharon Creech, Walk Two Moons

Of course I'll hurt you. Of course you'll hurt me. Of course we will hurt each other. But this is the very condition of existence. To become spring means accepting the risk of winter. To become presence means accepting the risk of absence. | The Little Prince

Tell me Atlas, what is heavier? The world? Or its peoples' hearts? | Darshana S, Atlas Still Stands, But Does Anyone Else?

Everyone discusses my art and pretends to understand, as if it were necessary to understand, when it is simply necessary to love. | Claude Monet

So the universe is not quite as you thought it was. You'd better rearrange your beliefs then. Because you certainly can't rearrange the universe. | Isaac Asimov

And thus the heart will break, yet brokenly live on. | Lord Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage

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You are a good person. And I'm in awe of this immediately. It makes me nervous. How kind you are, and how honest. How pure-of-heart, as they say. There's no white horse, no dazzling suit of armor, just your soft voice and quiet footsteps. Your kind eyes and slow, deliberate smile. I spent those first few months just watching you, wondering what to make of you. Suspended in a thick, buoyant tangle of my own bewilderment.

Of Ambivalence

I've had to do a few things of late that have been really quite difficult. Mostly because I've been deeply ambivalent about doing them. For the majority of my life I thought ambivalence was about not caring, when actually it's about caring in different directions, wanting 2 things that seem to oppose one another. I both desperately want this and desperately don't. I can hold those opposing truths in both hands at the same time. The Libra in me tries to weigh them, but that's not really the point.

I'm fine. And I'm not.

This is okay. And also, it's not.

I both want this and really, really don't.

I recently had to make a decision about something and was torn by my warring desires. I spoke to my girlfriends and got their advice, but realized, at the end of the day, the decision was mine alone. And that decision didn't really have anything to do with my wants or needs, so much as what I believe. What I believe in. Which is to say, my value system. Which is to say, who I am.

Value systems are incredible because they cut through the noise very, very quickly. And a path erupts before us. But very often that path is the most difficult, mostly because it has to do with vulnerability and telling the truth. So I swipe on an extra coat of lipstick for courage and practice remaining soft, feeling the things, all of the things, that are so very hard, but give life nearly all of its meaning.