22

I am twenty-two, and I think I’m over the hill.

I feel each heartbeat like a death knell, impossible to get back, a wasted second of a finite life.

I am twenty-two, and I want to dream outrageously.

I ask questions. I craft sentences.

I find myself awake at midnight, arrested by a thought.

I am awed by trees and ancient mountains, by rivers and unfinished canyons.

I feel music shaking in my blood cells.

I am twenty-two and I want to dream outrageously, but I don’t know how.

I want to go to work each day excited, invigorated, daunted, exhausted.

I want my job to seize my imagination and make it impossible to let go.

I want it to be hard. I want it to shape me. I want to love the hurtles that can re-create me.

(I work at a host stand and walk people to tables.

I smile constantly.

I want to throw myself out the window.)

I am twenty-two and I still believe in magic, because I still know where to look.

I believe in the goodness of people, but I am afraid that belief will change when I get hurt.

I want to fall in love and stay there, but finding a soulmate seems improbable, impossible.

I want to travel. I want to meet people. I want to learn.

I am twenty-two, and I still listen to the way the wind navigates New York City.

I am twenty-two, and I constantly wonder what it means to be alive.

I am curious, but my mind is full.

I am passionate, but I have no direction.

I am young, but I am not a child.

I am twenty-two, and the world has not yet claimed me.

I am twenty-two, and I still wonder if I can make me.