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oh! AND, might I add… 2019: the year I stopped taking anti-depressants.

23, you were really, really empowering

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24

day before 24… this year has been filled with so. much.

this year, I quit a job that stopped being fulfilling for the simple fact that I knew I had to do more and was capable of doing more. it was really hard to step away from something so good and so comfortable just for the sake of my own growth and happiness. the unknown can be scary, but sometimes what’s even scarier is staying within the same routine, stagnant in growth, and isolating yourself from the prospect of betterment. this year, I really took a step back and acted on the parts of my day-to-day that I knew were either good for me or not good for me. I had my first relationship for the first time in years, and it taught me that there is a purity in people that remains, despite conflict, hardship or loss. I dated the sweetest, kindest person ever. but as days passed I had to see whether or not I felt like I was growing through that relationship, and I wasn’t. for starters… it is incredibly difficult to end things when they aren’t necessarily broken. but what constituted brokenness for me was the lack of growing emotion I felt for him, despite him being the perfect person - always caring about how I was doing, always putting his needs behind mine, and always maintaining a growing curiosity between us that nurtured our relationship past a point of “how are you?” and “how was your day?”. But when things stop fulfilling you, when they don’t grow you to the person that you want to be, it becomes as much of a decision to not do something about it as it is to do something about it. I had to do what was best for us long-term and be really candid about my needs, as well as what I thought I would be able to give him (which, at the time, wasn’t much). we’re on good terms now though, and it makes me happy to know that I had something so pure and so sweet, despite the perspective I inherited from my last relationship. in fact, I’d call the two relationships polar opposites, and now I can hopefully focus on finding a happy medium… when and if that time comes. beyond that, I was able to restore three different friendships from my adolescence - three really important friendships to me. I think there is a uniqueness in the friendships you hold with people from your youth. they’ve seen you in a light that most people in adulthood haven’t, and that knowledge of you from when you grew to learn yourself helps paint a bigger, more complete picture of who you are as an adult. even if you are an entirely different person as an adult than you were as a kid (which I think most people are, to some extent), there is a purity to the dynamic between two people who grew up alongside one another. these friendships were mainly friendships I had in high school and the beginning of college, and I’d say anything between 18-22 is a really fragile, foundational time for what early adulthood will look like. what I took from restoring these friendships was that you can’t always control life and the direction it leads you in, but human nature shows us time and time again that love always prevails and connection is incredibly important. the very things that are the most difficult to talk about and are especially difficult to act on are the things that prove to us that we’re human. I know the toll it takes on you to feel like you are always on emotional overdrive, investing so much of your time and energy into people or things that may not always give back - but I wouldn’t trade it for a greater sense of automation. I think the things that bring you happiness in life (or in my life, anyway) stem from the beauty that comes from the very attributes of yourself that can feel very tiresome: emotional involvement/investment, and selfless love. with these qualities that make us human, we act on them and restore meaningful relationships, as well as make impactful differences in our lives that give us purpose. and eventually, things end up working out the way that they’re meant to… and there’s so much beauty in that too.

on my last day before 24, I received an official offer letter with a company I’ve dreamed of working at since I was a little kid… now entering the broadcast journalism space, I’m able to take the background I studied and thrive amongst some of our nations best storytellers, watching them do and be the best at the passion I have utmost respect for: writing. I couldn’t dream of a better professional trajectory than the one I’ve been dealt thus far. though not every step of the way has been perfect (it never is), I learned this year more than ever to turn feeling into action, and that the reality that follows will be fulfilling because it is backed with intention. change happens outside of your comfort zone, and the result is a really, really beautiful thing. at 24 I’m learning to trust the process, but now trust myself more than ever. it’s been a good year. 🎈

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Tracy Emin, Love is What You Want

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Van Gogh’s Letters

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Henri Matisse, Greek Torso with Flowers, 1919. Oil on canvas

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René Magritte (Belgian, 1898 - 1967)

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Robert Julian Onderdonk, A Road in Late Afternoon, 1921. Oil on canvas

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Gustav Klimt, Avenue in the Park of Schloss Kammer, 1912. Oil on canvas

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one of the most beautifully written pieces i’ve read in a long time is about a one night stand. it’s about the things you do once you’ve freshly had your heart broken. it’s by Rudy Francisco and I don’t want to forget it, so I’m going to leave it here:

LOPSIDED

She is a Stuttering soliloquy. A wounded symphony played by an orchestra of her family’s I-told-you-so's. A tattered woman who bleeds like an oak tree. Her life story is just a sandpaper love song written on a napkin full of all the reasons why no one should ever try to hug the rain. You always end up soaking wet and by yourself.

She: a rusty faucet, dripping self esteem that falls quicker than short skirts in motels when the sun blinks for too long. You see, when confidence hits the ground, it echoes like sin in a room full of God, and I could hear her coming a mile away. She has violin strings for legs, a graveyard of awkward treble clefs buried in her knees and I can see the suffering inside of the concert of her walk.

Her footsteps: they sound like the ignition to a father’s car the day that he decided that he was too thirsty to pour water on his own seed so when she calls me “daddy” I never really get excited because I know that it’s just the title that she gives the branches in her life that are destined to be abducted by the wind.

She comes over on Wednesdays. She walks into my room like a question that neither one of us has the courage to ask. Y’know sometimes, words, they get too heavy to sit on the ivory pedestals that we’ve built inside of our mouths. Y’know sometimes, our actions, they join hands and they become behaviors that are too complicated for lips to say out loud, so instead, we just liberate our flesh letting skin speak on our behalf, the language of those who are just as afraid of commitment as they are of being alone and we speak it like it’s our native tongue.

Honestly, I can’t tell you her favorite color… her middle name… or what her face looks like with the lights on. All I know is that we are both allergic to the exact same things. Things like compliments, the word beautiful and someone saying I love you with arms full of acceptance and sincerity on their breath.

Most days, I wonder what she carries in the luggage underneath her eyes. I wonder if those bags ever get too heavy for her face. But instead, I let those questions sandcastle inside of my stomach. I amputate the parts of me that have grown fond of her smell.

And I wash my sheets.

And I think to myself, You know most men are proud of things like this.

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having love in your heart will literally save you from the otherwise cataclysmic experience of being a human being

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it’s such a shame how much is left to say to the people you’ll never talk to again

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nothing i do is making this go away

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Claude Monet,  Arrival of the Normandy Train, Gare Saint-Lazare, 1877

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not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person not the right person

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it was nice, you were lovely