One Week

On my twenty-first birthday, I got my cat, Bijou. I went to Gardunos and sipped a coconut margarita. It is funny how quickly life boils over from one decade to another: This is my final week of my twenties.

I want to start by saying that I look forward to my thirties. I hope this is the decade when I will start and finish my doctorate, a goal that I have thirsted after for a long time. This will be the decade I finish all of these major literary projects that I have on the go, from Canis Major to Project Istanbul. I lost my teen years and my twenties to various health conditions. I truly believe that my thirties will be all mine, all mine to master and travel, starting with my first trip abroad, to Scotland at the end of July. In my thirties, I will see Iceland, write a really good poem, drink many satisfying cups of tea, model my life on Stevie Nicks and David Bowie, and learn a lot of languages.

But I am also going to witness my sisters find themselves in their careers and education. I am going to watch my mother establish The Carol Page Institute for Women’s Studies. I will read Sweeney Gray’s groundbreaking book in hardcover. Life is about the people who matter to us, and I am fortunate to have a lot of people who matter to me, from Vicki and Don to Kelly and Paige. These people hold memories like pressed leaves in a leatherbound book for me, have carried me through dark times, and have inspired me to be a better human being. I love them all.

I have one week to contemplate this decade before it stumbles on into the past, forever behind me and lapping me forward into the unknown on a choppy or gentle current. I am not sure what I will do in this one week. Will I finish my dream board that I have been building to inspire me when I apply to Columbia University this fall? Perhaps. Will I review the hiragana and the katakana and learn some kanji? Perhaps. Will I start on outlines for Project Istanbul? Perhaps. Will I annotate Americanah? Perhaps.

I will certainly be cuddling with my cats, watering the roses, and writing a short story based on a dream that I had.

I want to say so many poetic things, live in contemplation and read Joseph Campbell and Ludwig Wittgenstein, walk barefoot among the honeysuckles. The words come up like the tide, and then are gone, gone from my limping mind. I want to be a poem, not simply write them. I want to be good, and I want to taste the thrill of living. I nearly died when I was four, came back to the world when I was twenty-two, and now metamorphosize into a person worth being at thirty, the kind of person who is not afraid to call her project a novel or the kind of person who charges into Arabic without worrying about how her accent places her a rung below.

There are so many reasons that I love the summer, the way the daylight bleeds into the nocturnal hours. This summer is more poignant because it comes with it the promise of a first week of thirties life, one that I will record with my journal and my handy fountain pen. Today is Friday, May 26th, and I am going to sway and dance in my room and wear my favorite hats. This is only the first step, after all.