OLD SOUL INK

Every period of growth represents a stark and frankly frightening unknown. I've always gone kicking and screaming, preferring to stick with what I do know. There are worlds within worlds, in my head and heart, and anything new sends tremors rippling through all of these worlds. I appear to be easygoing, but I've learned how to appear that way. I appear to be adventurous -- and in many ways I am -- but the funniest little things terrify me. (It's a lot of work, being this way. I don't recommend it.) So many times in life the scenery remains the same and yet something has changed; perhaps we don't feel quite as connected as we did, to the people or things, or perhaps something has been permanently altered in the fabric that makes up our outlook. Whatever the case, there are times when I feel as though I'm an automaton, going through the motions of my life, wondering when I will feel like myself again. The last... oh, fifteen years have been that way, to varying degrees. So much has changed, enough that somehow I've landed back in the middle of myself again, in tune with who I am. Perhaps much more accepting of who I am.

I can read books again, hungrily, the way I used to do. (There was a long, long period during which I couldn't do this very well. It's hard to explain but it began immediately after a particularly traumatic event and I felt like I couldn't take a break from reality because it took everything I had just to keep it together. This became, eventually, just a part of me. Wow. I don't miss those days.) I can make/take time to just dream. This, too, used to be a huge important part of me. My best ideas come to me when I'm just sitting or lying somewhere with my eyes closed, thinking.

I don't feel anymore that I need to be perfect. Well, that's not entirely true; I feel the same need. I just don't pay attention to it. And that works, nine times out of ten.

I feel more myself than I've ever felt. Youth may be wasted on the young, but maybe it isn't.