25

This year's birthday post, a mark that I'm still here.

Another year, another birthday.

This year, I have been terribly good yet terrifically cruel. It reminds me of patterns I've been stuck in for a very long time, but isn’t life full of patterns? It’s only due to the awful gift of human consciousness how we can tell ourselves that we must change.

Yet, this year I've felt myself stay the same; a runt that refuses to grow, or a sown seed that skips the season just to meet it’s demise and regrow. While I have grown in some ways this year, none in any way remarkable, I am constantly bogged by the idea that I am at an age now where I am fully formed and the runt that grows with nurturing, education, and care is barely there anymore.

This year is another year I miss the season, for the soil was too heavy and coarse and once I sprouted I myself took an axe to the trellises that supported me. I no longer wish to play catch-up with my peers, no longer wish to fight over the space for my roots to extend yet I remember that I am still me. I hope for softer soil, a brighter sun, and for myself to find the nurturing I need for the next one.