Since I was twelve I have got a notebook or journal of some kind more or less consistently, and today when I leaf through several, re-reading words I no longer remember writing. It’s strange! In an embarrassing way! In a good way!
I’m not much of a diarist (though my earlier notebooks were certainly concerned almost entirely with boys and my parents and some of those school girl dreams and friends and my relationships with them.)
My notebooks usually contain the recordings of a haphazard, passionate life: words I’ve read and want to learn, conversations overheard, to-do lists, notes for poems, and sometimes the longer unraveling that I wrote to discover what I am feeling in a given situation or moment.
And oh, my twenties were abundantly full of feeling. Crushes/Relationships coming and going; loves arduous, delightful, foolhardy, intense. I was so holographic in my twenties. I was enormously influenced by books, music, a few friends, and a very few men I dated. And while I’m grateful for the journey with them, I am sometimes wistful that I don’t know some of them at all now, not even peripherally, in the tender and distant way you can only know a former love, now become a friend.
A few weeks ago I was chatting with a friend of mine about turning thirty plus; about the angst, you feel at the end of your twenties when you are told that the world is your oyster and you want to do everything you can to make sure it stays that way. You become preoccupied, maybe, with the way things appear (you check off certain boxes, perhaps: house, spouse, puppy, baby.)
I was so glad, looking back, to no longer feel that angst. To feel instead, the grace that comes with sticking with things; with letting the edges soften a bit. As I said to my friend: it’s not about doing more, it’s about being more. Quietly, subtly, within the very small orbit of your ordinary, extraordinary life.
That said, when I turned thirty-five I had no idea how I’d feel. I can remember my optimism and anxiety cocktail perfectly. I was obsessed with the idea that I had missed the boat already (for becoming a writer and artist; forever having an amazing body; for doing any kind of adventurous travel; for having a nightlife
I was sure that I was saddled for the long haul, and that in fact, it would be a haul. I was a mother and flirting with tenuous financial security and I hated my job more than I can even begin to describe. It unsettled me and sucked the creative energy from me in a way that left me frazzled and certain that I would never amount to a single thing in the world.
My bank balance was always on a precarious edge, it could tumble down around me like an igloo made of sugar cubes in a rainstorm.
Yet miraculously it didn't. I found a job I love. I found that being a mum came naturally. And slowly in the midst of depression and sadness, I discovered grace; wonder in the thistle-sweet heart of despair. I grew disciplined with well-being.
The first three fourth of this last year was hard. Unfathomably so - much like splitting hangover of the year before. And just like that, almost overnight I knew I had to go off tangent and make some difficult decisions, change - not just gears but also the car I was driving. So I did just that and it tittered on the edge threatening to fall over but began to equalize into the universe's rhythm and then it became like a springboard to the marvel of things to come.
The quiet serene core of me - a long time coming and on its axis slow-spinning magic.
I began feeling being more means being in the moment. It means discovering the day, wholly, with joy and wonder, and living into it as wholly as possible.
Now with a kind of tempered, hard-earned confidence, the kind that comes, trial by fire, through doing the difficult, painful parts of life.
From giving birth; from loving a small tiny extension of yourself until my heart could split like an overripe melon, revealing the sugary sweetness inside; from fighting and wincing and feeling small in relationships (all kinds) and growing from them, to become richer and deeper, like soil made from the decomposed refuse of last season’s garden clippings.
I lost a lot with a lot of unknown outcomes, still, I gained a grounded-ness I’m grateful for. I traded muscles and determination for all the thinness and whimsy I had at twenty-five.
And I’ve begun to discover how contentment can come slowly with the unfolding of a day: with waking up early, getting school-ready, running in the mountain tracks, to simple solo breakfast; with folding sheets fresh laundry; with the sound of the sea in the afternoons and mugs of tea whilst working; and later, story swapping after dinner. Of perpetual tiredness.
It’s about loving him hard: my boy with his sweet nerdy bits and laughter and innocence, and about discovering the overflowing love and grace of being the go-to aunt to girls in the family notwithstanding the travel restrictions and inability to hold them tight and smell their baby smells... recognizing the yearning for mum and missing her cooking and admonishing … and also wanting the best for me.
And I’ve begun to discover how contentment can come slowly with the unfolding of a day: with waking up early, getting school-ready, running in the mountain tracks, to simple solo breakfast; with folding sheets fresh laundry; with the sound of the sea in the afternoons and mugs of tea whilst working; and later, story swapping after dinner. Of perpetual tiredness.
It’s about loving him hard: my boy with his sweet nerdy bits and laughter and innocence, and about discovering the overflowing love and grace of being the go-to aunt to girls in the family notwithstanding the travel restrictions and inability to hold them tight and smell their baby smells... recognizing the yearning for mum and missing her cooking and admonishing … and also wanting the best for me.
Finally finding the joy of true self-love. It’s about understanding that none of these are mutually exclusive. You can never give what you don't possess. Right?
It’s also about getting ahead or falling behind and about hopefully ending up right where I’m supposed to be.
Universe hasn't really planned anything for us. Once we begin making our own choices with intent. The Intent of Desire or Fear - remains our choice.
And since it's a choice. Why feed the fear? When we can fuel the love - it comes naturally most time and when it doesn't during those tough times - taking a pause to collect the elegance of amber lights and showing up for self with kindness.
Thank You Dear Calendar for 2021! Here's to your pages of 2022...
Copyright © Nee
