It was one of those years that still feels difficult to put into words, as if the act of trying to do so creates an ache. The kind of year that held joy, adventure, ugliness, and pain all mangled up together into something impossibly complicated. A year that, taken at face value, should be effortless to name, and yet, extraordinary as it was, when I truly allow myself to step back into the past, and unravel 2025, it leaves me with the most imperceptible, yet undeniably bad taste.
I pulled the throw over my chest and tucked my book into my lap, shifting until I was just a little more comfortable. Pen, check.Sticky tabs, check.Cup of tea, check. This has been my preferred state of existence during nearly every free evening I’ve been …
Last year, on the night of the summer solstice, I turned 32, and you 31. We laid side by side on a flimsy blanket, snuggled next to our significant others, gazing up at the night sky. It was late – or early depending on how one saw it, but despite the countless wildfires that were hazing up the summer skies, we were graced by a nearly cloudless night. It was another one of those moments, the kind the four of us shared so effortlessly. Time stood still, as we existed amongst one another in a silence that salved our souls, while we peered out into the center of the Milky Way, tracing its curves with our fingertips. Minutes passed before we spoke, and in those mere minutes I remember recognizing that feeling. The kind where nothing else mattered, because past and future remained in their place, and only that single moment, that sliver of time meant everything. I realized that on this night of the summer solstice, when I turned 32 and you 31, the four of us created a memory, one that would forever be etched into a small, folded corner, of a single page of our existence. A moment that captured the wonder, the awe, the essence of what it feels like to be lying side by side, next to the people you love, gazing up into infinity. Nothing but a minuscule spec of dust, floating through the vast Universal timeline, a memory that not a single individual would remember once the four of us ceased to exist, and yet somehow, one I felt, must have etched its mark into forever. A moment of feeling alive, feeling connected, and feeling beyond grateful for this version of the timeline where we get to exist, together.
You told me that these moments, regardless of how complete or incomplete they felt, would always be a part of something bigger. That they deserved to be felt, and shared, because they would always mean something. I, unlike you, hoard moments; experience them, capture them and save them until they feel important enough to share, to mean something to someone else. But you reminded me that as long as they meant something to me, that was more than enough.
So here’s to another year, and another night, where I turned 33, and you 32 and I get to realize once more, how grateful I am for these moments together. Here’s to you, the one who never let go, Happy Birthday!
I have not been able to write for 3 years now. Sounds dramatic, I know, but it’s not untrue. Whatever skill or discipline I developed for myself since I began posting my writing in 2015 has mysteriously vanished since 2020, and I’ve been grasping onto as many faint strands of whatever is left of it ever since.
