"In the original version of 'Mary Poppins', there is a heartbreaking chapter about a pair of infant twins. As babies, they speak to a starling, and they understand what the wind whispers to the cherry trees on its way back up into the sky. The babies swear that they'll never be the adults who coo ridiculously at their bedsides, oblivious to the language of the flowers and bees. But, of course, they do forget, and they do grow up to use condescending words for things too beautiful for speech." (Larocca, 2014)

Growing up is both wonderful and horrifying. Things are changing fast: graduation, being away from my parents for the first time, and looking for work that is fulfilling both financially and emotionally. The life I have always known - the kind that is quite sheltered and half-buried in books - is being restructured and that can be frightening. But then, growing up may also lead me to situations where I can know myself better, where I can delve into my own unknown depths, and where I can thrive. A line from a poem by Rilke says, "You have not grown old and it is not too late to dive into your increasing depths where life calmly give out its own secret."
But you lose some when you gain some. I may start abandoning the child within me, taking such drastic measures to prove that I have grown up. As much as I promise myself to never lose sight of what matters most to me and to hold on to my ideals, I may also unknowingly forget and break that promise.

Someone at work remarked how my age will no longer begin with one ever again (unless, of course, I live for a hundred years) and that left quite an impression on me. I've known all along that it was bound to happen but when it did, it felt strange and new. I am now twenty. On my way to work, it hit me how today, twenty years ago, my mama gave birth to me, that this miracle called birth happened to me, and it just blew my mind.

I hope this letter will remind my future (grown-up) self of this general optimism - and even of some fear - towards growing up.

with love,
abelink

~

New York Magazine article on Tavi Gevinson growing up by Amy Larocca, 11-24 August 2014 issue

Poem by Rainer Maria Rilke