Wearing: Pinstripe and Floral

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

--"The Summer Day"

(H&M maxi dress and belt, LOFT pinstripe blazer, AE watch, Vera Wang bag)

I must be getting old...which isn't really cause for alarm, as much as cause for contemplation. My self-perception has been off-kilter and I find myself trying to reconcile the girl I once was with the woman I've become. I walk down the leafy boulevards of my childhood to analyze which paths I took...which choices brought me to this place I'm in today.

I softly meander through the library of my memories--stored recollections of hard times overcome and good times. I pull my memories off the shelves, here and there, and dust them off, one by one.

Looking back, I'm reminded that life is not a beginning or end. It's an epic journey--a grand exploration full of frolics through brightly colored meadows, steep climbs up awe-inspiring mountains, and hazardous treks across barren wastelands. It can be a traumatizing tempest or a sun-washed voyage across an ocean smooth as glass. Whether it's the best of times or the worst of times--this is all I've got.

Inevitably, I return to the stage on which my life is playing out right now. I gaze at the company of my little troupe with poignancy--my family, my friends...Scott--and am overcome by the goodness of it all.

Why should I be afraid of the what if's or should have done's? I am overwhelmed with the excitement one feels when setting off on a new quest. Great possibilities lie in the pathways just beyond...a new source of delight awaits discovery around the next bend.

While it's true my life is no longer governed by the emotional giddiness I experienced as a child, I find myself newly excited and wake up most mornings irrationally happy.

I must be getting old. I'll never return to the girl I was before, but I'm not less for it--I'm more.