wild strawberries

dear life, let me live according to my age.

past against present, life against death. growing up, growing old, aging… whatever you may call it, it is a subtle, merciless concept to grasp, to be at peace with.

i’m someone who does not believe in labeling certain memories as “regrets”. if i use that language, my spiral will go out of control. i’m only 22, thinking i’ve wasted some of my years trying to grow faster than others. i fear being punished for my haste. trying to learn everything, live it all… at times, i find myself feeling as though i inhabit ages my own mother and father have yet to see.

loneliness has always been a sensitive topic. as i watched an aged person come to an agreement with his own loneliness, a wave of sadness washed over me, in which i failed to find a part resembling me fully, yet, a familiar, seismic energy formed in my gut. the wave still hits my shore with a solemn rhythm. a part of it greeted me in a disguise i could not quite sort out at first. is this regret? had i not been honest with myself? did i keep a sealed box in my mind’s labyrinth, withheld from my own psyche? then it revealed its mask and i surrendered- this is fear. fear of not having lived enough, fear of not living right, fear of making a mistake and ruining the future i’ve yet to see. i shut my eyes and ears to the figure screaming “you’re alive, you’re in the future you fear deeply!” right in front of me. where did this complex stem from? i know better, forgiveness is the cure. i soothe myself, these are nothing but passing paranoia.

i relate to doctor isak borg, in the sense that i also need to find peace and closure in who i am as a person. for we did not come to this world to punish ourselves with loneliness, i shall refuse to surrender to every memory deemed a mistake in my subconscious. the ones before me have taught me to be better than them, and as i carry this forward and stick to my lessons, i shall strive harder for the ones after me. i shall face myself, with both the bravery and my teary eyes i had acquired when i was an infant, and acknowledge every version of me. always, across timelines.

despite it all, i’m alive.

i’ve been alive.