38

Sometimes, I read my own words and I wonder who wrote them.

They seem vaguely familiar, especially if there's a line I've used way too often in phone calls and updates and to the FedEx guy who visits me every Thursday morning at 9 a.m. I recognize my voice, know the stories are true. Still, I am regularly startled by what I see on my screen weeks, months, or even years after I've written it. 

This short-term composition memory is probably because I rarely re-read what I've tapped out on the old laptop before I hit publish. That means most of what I write is riddled with typos and grammatical errors and funky formatting and has a tendency to wind around and around a point. But that rawness is necessary. In all the time I've been a writer -- now most of my now 38 years -- I've come to understand that I will debate and edit and refine and rewrite word after paragraph after post until it is something completely different. There is a time and a space for that -- cover letters, one-sentence emails to The Ex, English Comp II papers, anything referencing my own lady business. But here, in this space, I want what is real and true in that moment to emerge and then live here, just as it is.

In fact, I have wanted to live more of my life that way. To slow the over-thinking. To ease up, especially on myself. To allow for breathing room. To be courageous. To spill as much as I have to offer in one moment, close my eyes and see what pours back over me. To edit less, voice more, listen even more than that. To trust that eventually the words, thoughts, people, opportunities, insights, release and all the rest of it will come.

And maybe, just maybe I have been doing more of that. At least that is what I thought when I turned back to last year's birthday post and read the words I was at first startled to realize were my own. As I read them again and then once more, what I saw there was what was true for me. Last year.

A year ago tonight, I wished for something intangible and unknown, I asked something big of myself and I entrusted that the universe would reveal it all to me when the time was right.

I wrote (I swear):

This is what I wished for as Lil E and I blew out the candles on the cake my mom made me. I want to be more and more myself. I want to find new parts of me. I want to ease the worries and enjoy what I have been given.

No matter how meditative I get on all of it, I know this will not be a year to relax. I do think, though, it is a year to revel. 

I bought a magnet that is on my refrigerator to remind me of all of this. It is glittery and pale green and has a winged angel on it. The words

BREATHE     BELIEVE      RECEIVE

hover above her and across her spread skirts,

IT'S ALL HAPPENING

And at 37, I choose to think that, in a whisper above the whoosh of our breath over the candles, the universe heard me. And she, like me, is cooking up a plan.

I hoped then that there was something big in the works. I know now that there was, there is. 

In this year, I have found a part of myself that I was afraid of -- the quiet, still piece of me that I have not given much time and space to grow before. I've learned to not only spend time alone but to enjoy it, crave it, understand more fully how it serves me.

I've also let go of some of my guilt about how much time I spend or don't spend here and instead chose to pour my heart out on real paper. Seeing my words in my own handwriting pulled my thoughts back to college, when I connected with the people I cared about most through letters, cards, poems and mixed tapes carefully strung together and wrapped in cases decorated with collages and neatly-penned lists of songs and artists. I was reminded of the value of vulnerability as I sent off letters and waited patiently for a reply. I re-learned how much loveliness there is in the anticipation and sweetness that does not come back in a few seconds or 140-character blurbs. I taught myself to rest assured that everything would appear -- in the mail, in a page, maybe even a call -- when the time was right. And you know what? It did.

I had no idea that what was in the works for me included training for and then quitting a pretty big running relay, purging half the clothes in my closet, saying goodbye for good to some people and finding my way to others who have had a surprising and profound effect on me, seeing so many shows, dancing so much, welcoming a tiny child into our family, or dealing with some of the same things I dealt with last year but with deeper understanding, more calmness, even some peace.

Some small steps -- a trip a few states a way alone with my boy, a decision to (finally, finally) sleep more than five hours a night, the question of whether I could run more than a minute or a block or a mile at a time, a thunderstorm of ideas about what I want next in my career and how to ignite that now, one moment of bravery that allowed me to let go of nearly a year of heartache, handing over the housecleaning to a very nice lady twice a month and having the skin peeled from my face -- have shifted me over just enough so that I see my world and myself in a completely different way. Those slight changes have sometimes been just like reading those posts of the past. I sit in wonder or confusion, eyebrows furrowed, not familiar with what is right in front of me.

Then I see. Ahh, this is it. My life.

And really, should we get so comfortable in our daily existence, in the things we do that we always expect to know it inside and out? I don't think so. I want to be moving along. I want to embrace the changes, to thank the goddesses for what is now and look out and ahead.

Like running down to see if there's anything other than bills in the mail. Like saying no to a party invitation to stay home and soak in the tub. To see what kind of outfit I can come up with if I let go of the same black shirts I've been wearing all year. To see how far I can sprint until I run out of breath and strength and energy. To see what story unfolds if I just start typing. To see if what I pressed my eyes shut and wished for really did come true.

It's exciting. It's validating. It's scary. It's a risk. It's a shot down the rapids some days and a slow paddle others. It's the end of one year. It's the beginning of a new one.

It's completely foreign and still completely me. It's still all happening.

Comments

[Mat]

I remember hand-written letters too! Our kids and grand-kids are going to think we're nuts when we wax-nostalgic on that. But those were SO wonderful, weren't they? Though I hate reading what I wrote years ago. At the time I thought I was really witty and clever and knew everything and now it's just embarrassing to read what I wrote! Like the journal I kept in Europe that had lines from rap songs scribbled in the margins. "Word to your mother!" WTF does that even mean?!?