yeah last update was 79 weeks ago, do that.
"When I was a freshman in college, the boy I fell in love with painted the cinder-block walls of his dormitory room navy blue, which was one of the nonsensical reasons I found to cleave to him forever. But before he did the painting, he took masking tape and taped down the words, Deferred Gratification above the single bedIt was as though we were so invested in the life of the world to come, whatever it was, that even mocking it, we had to wait. Waiting, waiting, deferring gratification until- what? Until something real began that wasnt school, and wasnt rote, and wasnt dull, and wasnt temporary. We knew not what.
I cannot remember when we divined the truth. It was probably after the wedding, and the job, and the house, and perhaps even after the first child, or the secondOne moment we were waiting, waiting for real life to begin, racing toward milestones only to arrive and say, That's all? And the next we look around and realize that that is all, that somehow without knowing it we have slipped sleepily into the next three decades of our existence. It even happens to the Peter Pans, who try to spit at their own mortality by extending their adolescence, eschewing the adult rites of passage, moving from one party to the next. The leaves of November will give way to the dirty ice of February and the Popsicle wrappers of July, and those will be the only markers for years at a time.
In retrospect, of course, we will realize that there have always been landmarks, but that we see them only in hindsight, as buoys on the horizon. The unraveling of a best friendship. The slow development of professional competence. The gradual settling into a particular place we call home. One day we realize that we are not waiting but living. No more will we peg everything on the Christmas holidays, or a new job. It is only living with the slow beating of our own hearts that is real. This is your life. It is a strange sea change, pleasant if the horizon looks sunny, shot with long strands of pink and gold. Soothing even, after all the years of waiting. But disconcerting nevertheless.
I always lived in anticipation...that it was all a preparation for something else, something "greater," more "genuine." But that feeling has dropped away from me completely. I live here and now, this minute, this day, to the full, and the life is worth living."
-not my words.
I cannot remember when we divined the truth. It was probably after the wedding, and the job, and the house, and perhaps even after the first child, or the secondOne moment we were waiting, waiting for real life to begin, racing toward milestones only to arrive and say, That's all? And the next we look around and realize that that is all, that somehow without knowing it we have slipped sleepily into the next three decades of our existence. It even happens to the Peter Pans, who try to spit at their own mortality by extending their adolescence, eschewing the adult rites of passage, moving from one party to the next. The leaves of November will give way to the dirty ice of February and the Popsicle wrappers of July, and those will be the only markers for years at a time.
In retrospect, of course, we will realize that there have always been landmarks, but that we see them only in hindsight, as buoys on the horizon. The unraveling of a best friendship. The slow development of professional competence. The gradual settling into a particular place we call home. One day we realize that we are not waiting but living. No more will we peg everything on the Christmas holidays, or a new job. It is only living with the slow beating of our own hearts that is real. This is your life. It is a strange sea change, pleasant if the horizon looks sunny, shot with long strands of pink and gold. Soothing even, after all the years of waiting. But disconcerting nevertheless.
I always lived in anticipation...that it was all a preparation for something else, something "greater," more "genuine." But that feeling has dropped away from me completely. I live here and now, this minute, this day, to the full, and the life is worth living."
-not my words.