Living and living well currently.
I've only just begun to truly live, honestly.
I am 24. The man next to me on the train this afternoon is roughly 84.
I wonder what I'll do in the next 60 years... At what point will I tire of living?
Life is hard for everyone. It's just hard in a different light.
I can't fathom becoming sick of traveling and seeing the world, but I know one day I will.
One day I'll punch in at a nine to five, marry a man, have a few children, and eventually grandchildren, somewhere around celebrating 30 years of said marriage.
I've lived 24 years and I'm happy with the way those 24 years turned out for me so far. Obviously some years were better than others.
At 24 I've seen 14 countries, lost countless loved ones but gained several dear friends in their place. I've watched some of my best friends marry the love of their life. I have one nephew (not blood.) Most importantly, I've moved far away from home trying to make a start - twice. And all of this has just been in the past 18 months or so.
In my lifetime, historically, I've witnessed the fall of the Twin Towers in New York City via every TV screen in passing on September 11, 2001. And I've seen it remembered every 11th of September since.
Since I was 12, there have been American soldiers, foreign soldiers, foreign civilians and domestic civilians, losing their lives daily fighting in a war "to end terrorism." A war which most people still don't know or understand why we are fighting. Myself included. Doing the math, that is exactly half of my life my country has been at war.
In 2004 I learned, along with the rest of my state, the damage a natural disaster can cause. Or in New Orleans' case, weak structure can cause.
In 2005, Katrina came, she saw and she conquered New Orleans and many other gulf coast cities, including cities in the state of Mississippi.
The devastation of Katrina came when the levee broke. The footage from this natural disaster will forever be in my mind. People sitting on the roofs of their homes waiting for someone to save them. Locals driving around in their boats looking to help anyone they could. Survivors looting throughout the stores in the town taking whatever they could for survival, or some took TVs and other useless commodities. The entire city became water.
I've lived in a country which has had more public shootings in the past five years than there has been wars in the entirety of man. Or so it seems. One shooting is one shooting too many.
I've lived through the deaths of countless iconic public figures, including Michael Jackson.
If I get even 10 more years in this life I can't imagine the possibility of events that will occur.
I got my first gray hair about six months ago when I was living in New York City. That place could give a 10-year-old girl gray hairs.
My mom laughs at me because I refused to pull the gray hair out, even though it's rooted very obviously at the front of my part. I tell her I'm keeping it because it's my knowledge.
She tells me to wait 'til I'm 30-something and see how happy I am about grays then. I have always said I'll never die my hair. And I've stuck true to that so far.
I'll take pride in my gray hairs and my wrinkled skin no matter how early it comes. It's just my body telling a story.
This isn’t much of a blog, just a few thoughts I had on the way home today. It’s funny how quickly times passes and how fast things change, often in as little as six months time. I guess I’m lucky I enjoy writing and journaling because otherwise I don’t think I’d remember some moments or days in my life. At least not the details of them. I never want to forget my own story.
Remember where you've come from, and if you can't, you better start writing it down. Some of the most beautiful people I know have more wrinkles than a crumpled piece of paper. Embrace age :)
The most beautiful person I know is my grandmother. Many of you already know how fond I am of that 'ol broad. Although I may stray form the straight and narrow, at the end of the day I aim for nothing more than to be half the woman she is.
My G is tough when she needs to be and a softy at all other times. There isn't a stray she won't take in, and I'm not limiting that to four legged critters. She's got a heart of gold and I like to think I at least take after her in that way. She could see the best in her own killer's heart.
I think about the life she has lived compared to my own 24 years. My G is approaching 75. That's 25 short of a century. I love listening to her talk about growing up and the struggles that didn't even seem like struggles to her then.
When she was a child, she told me for Christmas they got fresh fruit in their stockings and new dresses and underwear made from cow feed sacks, and that this was a big deal. She remembers growing up through the Depression when her youngest sister was a baby and the neighbors gave her family their milk rations.
I once asked her how they ever survived life in Louisiana before air conditioning and she simply replied, "we didn't know what we were missing." Brilliant! Now you won't catch my G without the air blasting on 69 degrees or lower. That is her luxury and I daresay she's earned it.
Every year my G and her family went to Washington to pick apples. Yes, all the way to Washington to pick apples. I still don't understand this. I guess it was the closest thing to a vacation available to farmers. This eventually led to her meeting my Pawpaw and them marrying when she was 15. From there she raised four children, worked, retired and God knows how many worldly events she's witnessed first hand. For starters, Vietnam War, JFK's assassination, Civil Rights Movement, the 70s, and so on.
I realize I'll live through my fair share of significant historical events, but sometimes I envy the things she's witnessed.
All this being said, I'm looking forward to the future: good or bad.
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| My girl! <3 |
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