nineteen

30 October 2019

Oh, the most annoying question in the world? Well I think I finally have an answer to it.

Today I turned nineteen, and, yes, I do feel older. Older than I was yesterday. Older than I was two weeks ago. Older than who I’ve been for the past year. 

Many of the words I have yet to say are muffled by the sound of overflowing kindness, of a genuine interest in where I am in my journey around the Sun. I don’t really know how I got here, I just know that my current location is lightyears from where I started. From who I was when the world was still foreign, when independence was a prospect, when uncovering my identity just meant brushing away the dust. 

This time around, I do feel older. Something in me has changed with the date. Something that’s wanted to change--needed to change--for months. Eighteen saw more life than it could handle, and I just think that all of the lingering questions I’ve had about this path I’ve forged thus far are not what I say they are. They aren’t lingering. They’re waiting to see what answers this new year has to offer. What explanations, spoken with fluid lips of futures seen through clear eyes, I can offer myself. 

I can offer myself

I can offer myself

I can offer myself.

Say it louder through each passing year. I am not a glint of identity. I am a malleable flame of light.

My eighteenth year of living can be interpreted as more of a fight than a livelihood. No, I didn’t make enemies. I actually made a lot of friends. And still I look back and see a year of arguments and stubbornness and doors shut in my face. And with that number no longer defining me, I see the other side of the door, including the person clinging to the handle. She has a familiar face, yet she sees no familiarity in the void of her surroundings. She’s confused as to why she has to ask the Sun for its light to shine on her. That used to be something given so freely. Little does she know that it’s something she can offer herself.

She can offer herself.

She can offer herself.

She can offer herself.

Say it louder through each passing year. I am not a glint of identity. I am a malleable flame of light. 

Nineteen will be brighter. Nineteen will be smarter. Nineteen will whisk me away.