1.1.13

This, the Year


Recurring milestones have a way of gauging how far you've come.

Every new year when the ball drops and the countdown begins, so comes a recollection of the years before. Each is a frozen encapsulation of a time, a place, a moment signifying progression: girlfriends dressed to the nines in a confetti wash, slow dances with a man, pot and pan clanging in pajamas and bare feet with cousins, falling asleep against a friend on the floor as the ball drops on screen.

It would concern the reader little, perhaps, to know, how despondently a girl sees a year come to a close; how she feels as if she were dismissing some portion of herself into the muddled myst of memory. Yet, I have nothing else to tell; unless, indeed, I were to confess that no year, as of yet, has seen so much growth than this past one. Twenty four sent me into a tailspin, plunging this tantalized small-town dreamer into the throng of a professional, downtown scene. and in this year a girl became a woman.

I'm compelled, however, to speak not of the past, but of what is to come. For now that I've flown, walking makes me restless. And now that I've sprouted wings, I must learn how to fly.

I love change. the alteration of a common course of action dishevels the stagnation of redundancy and ripples through all components of everyday life. And as I stand at the crux of such a catalyst, this new year, I've been given a new start, a fresh page, a blank staff. It's an opportunity to start anew, to relinquish the old self and begin again.

Twenty five is the start of a new me. A bold me. A daring me. An honest me. I will stop scolding myself for missing personal publishing deadlines. I will write for me, just for me. I'll go with my gut. I will date men, not boys. I'll learn to love the wretched havoc that is monday morning. I will row to Antelope Island. I'll successfully grow herbs. I'll learn yoga and take indoor cycling classes. I will see the northern lights. I will apply to graduate school. I'll move to Boston or New York or Chicago. I will see more of the ocean. I'll pick up the violin again. I'll get a dog. I'll finish that damn novel. I will cross the lines I drew in my early twenties. I'll embrace my vulnerabilities. And I will learn the slow, elegant art of living.







© 2013 by Rachel Lowry. All rights reserved {photo source via}

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