On being late
I think I’ve spent most of this year feeling late.
Late to healing. Late to moving on. Late to becoming the person I thought I’d be. Late to a life that seems to be happening for everyone else.
It’s ridiculous when I write it down.
I’m twenty four.
Twenty four.
And yet somehow I’ve convinced myself I’ve missed deadlines that were never real to begin with.
I don’t know when life became a race.
Maybe somewhere between graduation and now.
Maybe the first time someone my age got engaged. Or bought a house. Or announced a pregnancy. Or landed the dream job. Or posted another smiling photo that made it look like they had figured everything out.
Meanwhile, I was still trying to figure out how to survive a year that felt determined to change everything.
The truth is, I thought I’d be arriving at twenty five.
Instead, I feel like I’m beginning again.
A different home. A different version of family. A different understanding of love. A different understanding of myself.
The map I spent years following doesn’t exist anymore.
And for a long time, that terrified me.
Because if the plan disappears, what are you supposed to do? Who are you supposed to become? Where are you supposed to go?
I’ve spent months searching for answers to questions that don’t seem to have any. As if clarity is something waiting around a corner for me. As if one day I’ll wake up and suddenly know exactly where my life is heading.
But maybe nobody knows.
Maybe the people I envy are just as afraid.
Maybe everyone is standing in front of a future they can’t see.
Some are just better at pretending otherwise.
I keep thinking about how many versions of myself have existed already.
The girl who sat her exams.
The girl who fell in love.
The girl who lost it.
The girl who became someone’s entire world.
The girl who became a stranger.
The girl who stood at a funeral and realised life was far less permanent than she’d believed.
The girl who packed boxes.
The girl who unpacked them.
The girl writing this now.
Every single one of them thought they knew what came next.
None of them were right.
And somehow that’s comforting.
Because every time life surprised me, I survived it.
Not perfectly.
Not gracefully.
But enough.
Enough to get here.
Enough to be staring twenty five in the face.
