25

happy birthday to me

a journal entry on the night before my birthday

what a year of learning, 24 was.

i learned, that you won’t remember the terrible chapters of your life the way that you won’t ever forget the magnificent ones. fortunately, a deep pit of anxiety is not as memorable as laughing until your belly hurts.

i think the way to save yourself from never-ending trepidation is realizing you only control the way you react. unrealistically, my only goal for this year is to feel. i want to deeply ingrain into my memory, the way my skin naturally warms under a flowering dogwood tree. the way it prickles under the hot July sun and suddenly i am calm. how my heart beat slows in my husband’s arms. i need to remember what joy resembles in my body. i need it to come back to when i begin to forget. the only thing that matters is what we do with the cards we are dealt, because everything just is.

everything just is, no matter how profound or ordinary it may seem to me. i relinquish the control i perceived i had over my life, for i have finally realized it was all an illusion. i give it up to God, for it was always His. i am now free. and i hope to never forget the deep sigh of relief that i took the moment i organized those thoughts together in my mind.

this year i relearned, as an adult, that nobody is coming to save you. the natural order of the universe dictates that you are born alone and you will face death alone. that just is. you will come across people that will accompany you on your journey in-between. if you are lucky enough, you will love so deeply, that you cannot remember a life before them and it hurts to imagine one without them. but, you must never lose yourself in the feelings you have for someone else. when you are fighting your own mind, only you can pull yourself out of the deep end. this comes to my next lesson of the year: loving (and knowing) yourself.

i constantly miss the simplicity of being younger, but what a privilege it is to get to know myself at every age i become.

i drink my morning latte in the same mug with the green handle every morning. i found my signature scent this year. it is earthy, like black tea and vanilla. my most read genre of book feels like it could come to life but probably won’t. i still thrift all my clothes because i prefer it that way. i collect vintage bags and trinkets line my shelves. i love to craft with my hands. i am deeply sentimental (so i will always stop for a souvenir). it is enthralling to wake up and recognize the woman in the mirror as yourself. there are parts of me who do not sway from who i have always been. my eyes and my hair belong to every version of me. i have always picked at my cuticles when my nerves get too high. i don’t plan anything out and i am infamously unorganized. i am susceptible to avoidance and i hate confrontation. i chronically lose my glasses. but despite the sins of your past, you hope that someone also may call you their close friend. that animals may feel solace in your presence. that strangers don’t forget you immediately on their way out. you hope that you are a good person. that is the ultimate goal, isn’t it?

i also learned this year that when life is the teacher, you will always fail the class. not because it is just that dreadful and evil, but because you can never prepare well enough. you can not anticipate the questions, let alone the answers. it is purely a learning experience. you just live as best as you can. to the best of your knowledge and to the best of your ability. you smell the morning dew and feed the birds at your balcony. you hug the people you love so tight. you laugh until your belly hurts and you cry so hard your eyelashes are soaked. you experience the wonders of the earth. and when it gets too hard to breathe, you always have napalm skies and your hometown streets. you have photo albums to flip through. you have the village of friends and companions you found on this in-between journey. you have yourself. you have music and you have your leatherback journal. you have your words. you turn off your phone and suddenly, you have everything that matters in the world right at your fingertips.

experience life through the way you feel, not the things you do.

until next year, this was proof of life at 24.