The Archer
If I’m being completely honest, I don’t know how I feel about my birthday anymore.
The passing years seem to wisp by a little too stealthily these days, and I know there’s nothing I can do about it.
What I don’t know, is what I’m supposed to do with it.
It’s a lot to process, you know. Birthdays. The inevitable yearly reminder that we are aging.
Almost as if I can feel the time slipping past me like sand through my fingers, and I just can’t hold onto it long enough.
I turned 23 today, and all I can think about is how I will never be 22 ever again. I can never go back, ever. It’s gone, forever. Lost in a heap of 22 numbers that came before it.
I don’t want to sound dramatic, but I think it is. It feels dramatic. Like I’m mourning a death. 22-year-old me has been lost forever, may she rest in peace.
I guess I didn’t believe the “time flies” rumors back then, but I do now.
With every birthday I find myself holding onto my younger self more and more. Depending on her more and more.
10 year old me.
11 year old me.
I say it all the time and I’ll say it again, she knew what she was doing.
I had it all figured out back then. I used to read & write all the time, do my homework as soon as I got home, pick out an outfit for the next day, basically everything that I wish I could do now.
She was more patient and grateful. Everything that I’m not anymore. Everything that I wish I could be again.
I’m almost certain that my 11-year-old self could live my life better than me right now. She’d do a better job. People would like her more.
When I was little I had such a schedule. I would legitimately carry around a little piece of paper with a morning routine…. (you cannot make this stuff up). I probably did this every single morning for a good 6 months. Maybe longer honestly but I don’t remember.
You can’t even blame me for looking to her for everything. Even for the things I know she wouldn’t be capable of I still ask myself what younger me would do.
What younger me would think. How she’d think. What she’d feel about it all. What would she deem a waste of time or not?
I legitimately base decisions on this, and I’d be stupid not to. I can’t help it.
I look up to little me so much (if that’s even possible).
Although lately it’s been feeling like it’s finally time.
Time to let go. Time to move on. Time to let that version of me rest.
She got me this far, but her road ends here. She can’t take me any further.
It’s time now. Time to become the new version of me. Embrace her and grieve the loss of the other.
I can see it. My future.
Just over the next hill, and I’m not there yet but it’s the final stretch.
I can see it all.
When I look back I realize that it was always meant to be. All of it was always supposed to have happened. In the exact way that it did.
22 was a rough one I will not lie. I will not bore you with the details (kidding it would not be boring), all I will say is I will never forget being 22.
23 on the other hand, has an intriguing air about it.
I have it written somewhere that 23 was going to be the last age of craziness before I reached 24 when “I will reap all the fruits of my labor.”
My birthday is in 2000 so whatever year it is that’s how old I’m turning.
I’m a Sagittarius. The ninth sign of the zodiac. The fire sign. The Archer.
It’s like I can feel time moving through everything, taking me with it no matter how hard I fight.
I know I said I didn’t know how I felt about my birthday, but I guess I was lying.
I do know how I feel about it.
I feel like I’ve traveled another trip around the sun. I feel nostalgic. I feel a million emotions at once, but I guess that still counts.
I'm also learning to redefine what birthdays mean to me.
Not a scary reminder of mortality, but proof of a life lived.
A testament to the wisdom and experience gained.
A memory in the making.
So, here’s to turning 23 at the end of 2023.
Here’s to mourning the loss of my younger self because I’ve outgrown her.
To another trip around the sun.
To the inevitable passage of time.
Here’s to 23 & me.