I've done too much too soon and at the same time not enough.
In thirty years I've seen the Falls but not the Canyon. I've had pneumonia but never a broken bone. Broken a heart or two and had mine broke; thrown big heavy stones in pretty glass houses.
In thirty years, I've been married, been divorced, and married again, travelled the country but not the world, been pierced but not tattooed, moved five times in five years, but never owned a home, and one time almost drowned but then didn't.
In thirty years I've whale-watched on a choppy Pacific, swam in a salty Atlantic, and once, on a whim, got in the car with Matt, car doors shut, key in ignition, and followed signs three hours east to the coast, and when we got there at midnight, pulled off all our clothes and ran naked and hollering under a full moon and clear sky.
There was a time when I thought that in thirty years, and for better or worse, that I'd hit every major life event - good, bad, ugly, glorious, and strange - and that way, by thirty, I'd have this being alive thing pretty much sorted out.
But, (surprise), thirty years have wrought more Questions than Answers, roughly 11,000 days and nights
of anomalies,
of quandaries,
and the occasional
slow-cooked revelation.
I'm hoping, in the end, that it all balances out, like some elegant equation. Maybe, even if I can't tell now, everything is (okay and) exactly where it needs to be, here and right, exactly, now.
Above: Portrait of author by Isabella Rotman
In thirty years I've whale-watched on a choppy Pacific, swam in a salty Atlantic, and once, on a whim, got in the car with Matt, car doors shut, key in ignition, and followed signs three hours east to the coast, and when we got there at midnight, pulled off all our clothes and ran naked and hollering under a full moon and clear sky.
...But I'm terrified of getting lost.
There was a time when I thought that in thirty years, and for better or worse, that I'd hit every major life event - good, bad, ugly, glorious, and strange - and that way, by thirty, I'd have this being alive thing pretty much sorted out.
But, (surprise), thirty years have wrought more Questions than Answers, roughly 11,000 days and nights
of anomalies,
of quandaries,
and the occasional
slow-cooked revelation.
A mystery in lamplight, fluorescent, and disco ball, alternately.
I'm hoping, in the end, that it all balances out, like some elegant equation. Maybe, even if I can't tell now, everything is (okay and) exactly where it needs to be, here and right, exactly, now.
Above: Portrait of author by Isabella Rotman
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