Here’s what I’ve learned in the years leading up to 29:

Loss will happen. When adults say “nothing lasts forever” they’re not just trying to squeeze the optimism out of their teenagers, or leave a bitter comment about losing dreams or other such nonsense…they’re talking about really losing. People who existed are now no longer. Stores, ways of life, technology. Nothing ever stops changing. 

That being said, some things are always the same. And by some things, I mean you. Even as time passes, what makes you “you” at 8 is the same thing that makes you “you” at 18, at 28 and so on… Don’t believe me? Talk to any 5 year old for 20 minutes. The presence of their personality and who they are will strike you as being odd. You will think, “How can you be so sure of who you are when you’ve only been alive for 5 years?” Because they just are.

Time is both meaningless and meaningful. I remember when I turned 10 years old and I thought, Oh my god I’m a decade old. A WHOLE DECADE. I remember mourning not being a kid anymore and wondering what it would be like to be a teenager and wondering if I could still play with my barbies.

I remember turning 12 and thinking, “Oh my gosh, I was such a baby at 11.” I remember thinking that when I turned 13, and 16 and 21.

I remember worrying about turning 18 and having to sign all my own papers without my parents’ advisement and thinking that I would somehow make a decision that would screw up my entire life.

I remember wanting to be older yet hold on to what made now now. I’m not sure if that ever stops.

Some days just go by with no memory of the mundane. And some days there are things that happen and stay with you for as long as you’re alive.

I’m not sure what it is about birthdays that makes you stop and really think about what you’re doing, where you’re going and where you’ve been. I definitely find that as I get older, I want to do that more and more.

I think part of it is just wanting to make sure I’m doing things “right.” And maybe part of it is just to make sure I don’t forget what came before.

Here’s to my last year in my 20s.