"i will never grow so old again"

           Last night I was listening to Astral Weeks.  I've been listening to Van Morrison's growly voice float off the stereo singing about "gardens all wet with rain" for as long as I can remember. That record is linked to so many happy memories from drastically different periods of my life and it has this way of muting whatever problems are currently nagging at me and instead causing me to reflect.  My birthday is next week, and when I look back at the last year, I'm smiling, and I'm smiling as I move forward into the next one.  This is not because I didn't make a whole lot of mistakes last year, and it is not because I am perfect and it is not because I have everything all figured out.  My contentment doesn't come with being 100% satisfied with myself and it does not mean I am finished improving.  I have made a lot of mistakes and unfortunately there have been many times I have acted selfishly and times I have hurt people when I could have helped them.  Yes, I am proud of the ways in which I've grown, but I am still determined to try harder and grow stronger.   This ease of mind does not come with surrender; instead, it comes with acceptance-- accepting that I am extremely blessed, accepting that there is a time for everything, and accepting that I can always find a reason to smile. 

Photograph by Audrey.

a charmed life

Goose Pond, Keene, New Hampshire

Don't you love when a weekend makes you so happy you don't even mind that it's Monday?

I woke up this morning on my couch, with records and empty cocktail glasses scattered around the living room.  Today my best friend, Sarah, moves to Rhode Island.  Friday night everyone showed up at the bar to drink one too many beers and give their goodbyes. 

On Saturday I spent the day in Dublin enjoying idyllic New Hampshire (there's a reason I live in this state).  It was one of those hot, sleepy days where you wish you could stop time because the sky is so blue and the sun is so warm and the water is so clear.  Dillon, Erin, Tim and I manned up and went swimming in Dublin Lake- the lake was so cold it stopped your heart, but once it started beating again, the water felt like heaven.  That night after I left work, Sarah came over and we planned our Mad Men party until the wee hours of the morning.  We pinned list after list to my bathroom door, made trivia cards, and set multiple alarms so that we didn't forget to wake up.  

Yesterday was a whirlwind.  Sarah and I started party preparations at 8am, which including robbing armfuls of fresh flowers from campus, spilling a bag of ice all over my kitchen, and lots and lots of baking.  We were so on schedule we even allowed ourselves thirty minutes to run down the trail to Goose Pond for a quick swim. 

The party was wonderful.  My apartment was full of my favorite faces, and seeing everyone dressed up made me realize what good-looking friends I have.  We drank Tom Collins' and mint juleps, ate fondue, snapped silly photos on disposable cameras and listened to jazz records.  After the last guest left,  I sat on my couch reflecting on everything.  The muggy midnight air floated through my open windows and fused with the sweet smell of the flowers scattering my apartment.  I breathed it in, and felt so lucky.  Saying goodbye to Sarah was very hard (I don't think I've ever cried so much saying goodbye to someone),  but I knew this weekend had been the perfect send-off. I grabbed a blanket and pillow, unplugged the twinkle lights, placed A Love Supreme on my record player and drifted off to sleep feeling very blessed and fortunate to know such lovely people.

to make the mundane interesting

By Monday, things were starting to feel mundane.  It is hard for me to conclude on what type of person I am.  On one hand, I have always desired a routine, a set schedule, a circle of friends who would always, always be there.  I like organization, and I love making lists.  But then there is the other me.  The person who wants to constantly be somewhere exotic, tasting new things, observing new people in settings I’ve never before experienced, attempting activities I haven’t tried previously. 

I just finished reading Veronika Decides to Die by Paulo Coehlo (thank you to my friend, Whitney, for the recommendation).   Without giving too much away, the book centers upon a young girl in her twenties, living in Slovenia, who decides to take too many sleeping pills so she doesn’t have to live anymore.  She does live though, and awakens in a mental hospital where she is told that she has severely damaged her heart and does not have more than a week to live.  Realizing that death is imminent, and that she has nothing to lose, Veronika experiences things that she hadn’t before permitted herself.  She no longer weighs her existence on what other people think of her, and she allows herself to feel true hatred, and true love, and ultimately realizes that the life she previously had wanted to extinguish is worth living after all.  

It is a lovely and thought-provoking story, and it helped me to work out the restlessness I was feeling.  Instead of feeling sorry for myself because of the monotonous aspects of my current situation, I should instead change what I can.  So instead of going on Facebook this week, I’m taking the time to read some books I wanted to read.  Last night, instead of filling up my time after work with the usual, and then scrounging something cheap up for dinner, I decided to go home and make (and subsequently demolish) a delicious Gouda and red salad pizza with a friend, and then read a good book and fall asleep early.  It was different, and that was nice.  What I’m clumsily trying to say, is that you don’t have to do what everyone wants you to do!  Go to the movie alone if you’d like.  Talk to that interesting person you see every morning as you walk to work.  Tell the people you love that you love them and stop caring about how they will respond.  Step outside the box society has created, and the mundane can become interesting again.  It’s such a simple, but important lesson to grasp.  It is not necessary to change locations to experience something new in our surroundings.