Still (longer title)

There is a strange freedom that comes with age.

Not the freedom people imagine. Not the freedom of caring less.

The freedom of caring about the right things.

Of no longer chasing approval. Of no longer twisting yourself into shapes that make other people comfortable. Of finally understanding that your worth was never something another person could bestow upon you.

It was yours all along.

I like the woman I have become.

Not because she is perfect. She isn’t.

She has made mistakes. Loved the wrong people and the right ones. Stayed too long sometimes and left too soon others. She has had her heart broken and broken hearts herself. She has been brave and foolish and hopeful and stubborn.

She has lived.

And somehow, through all of it, she has remained open.

That feels like an accomplishment.

The world has a way of convincing us to become smaller as we grow older. More practical. More cautious. Less willing to be moved.

Yet I find myself wanting the opposite.

I still want to be surprised by a beautiful song. I still want conversations that stretch late into the night and leave me thinking about them later. I still want to wander streets in cities I’ve never seen before. I still want to laugh until my stomach hurts.

I still want wonder.

Not because something is missing from my life.

Because I am fully awake to it.

Because there is a difference between being alive and feeling alive, and I have learned not to take either for granted.

There are stars I haven’t found yet. Stories I haven’t written. Places I haven’t wandered. Bottles of wine waiting to be shared with people whose company makes the hours disappear.

There is still so much life left to live.

Perhaps that is what I know now that I didn’t understand when I was younger.

Joy is not something we earn after all the difficult things are over.

It exists alongside them.

Wonder exists alongside disappointment.

Gratitude exists alongside grief.

Love exists alongside loss.

The trick is not avoiding heartbreak. The trick is refusing to let it close us.

And despite everything, I find myself standing here with my heart still open to beauty.

Still open to joy.

Still open to surprise.

Still open to life.

And that, I think, is something worth celebrating.