Why am I here? Who is reading this? No one should be reading this. In any case, I'm not the same girl anymore so you may as well leave those expectations at the door. I don't have the same dreams. Life has caught on and how. I don't even know the woman I was, say, last year. Perhaps this is a sign of growth. Perhaps. 

Many things I prayed for came true in this time. I think I have managed to come home to myself; several delusions that made up my formative years have been parted with. Some parts of me have been left behind too, along with some people, who I believed, made me who I am. I am not the summation of the people I love/loved. I simply am. This knowledge is both scary and freeing. There is more peace - the real kind. 

There is no aching, burning love. There is love, however; and it resides in the books on my bedside shelf, in the morning breeze when I cycle, the hours watching HP over and over again, in Mary Oliver's words, in Nam's house, and in her heart. There's relief in knowing that my family survived the pandemic, that my friends are okay even if they are sad sometimes, that I am okay even if I am sad sometimes. That those who I once knew very well and don't know anymore are okay too. There is much to be grateful for.