"when there's nothing left to burn,

...you have to set yourself on fire."


how many wishes have you made over the course of your life? how many wishbones have you split, candles have you blown out, minutes have you stared at the clock, waiting for 11:11? in my 21 years, few of the hundreds of things i've asked for in these moments have ever materialized, and none with proof that it was my wish that brought them to fruition in the first place. and yet i, much like everyone else, continually grasp at opportunities to do it anyway.  

this spring, however, something different happened.  my wish came true, and in the clearest of ways.  funny thing is, it took me this long to realize it.  

there's a wishing tree in the courtyard of the peggy guggenheim museum in venice, a scrawny little thing covered in handwritten notes with words that reverberate no matter the language they're written in.  happiness. famiglia. amour.  yet in a moment of selfishness, i didn't wish for world peace or the health of my family or love for everyone i know.  i wished for the one thing i wanted more than anything, the one thing i've never had.

i wished for something of my own. 

even then i wasn't sure what i was looking for specifically.  but for so long, i felt like i was living other people's lives for them rather than living my own.  i would have much rather sorted through my friends' messes, solved their problems, and shared in their successes than create a real life for myself.  while part of my motivation for this was, of course, my love for my friends and my desire to be as strong of a support as possible, mostly it was plain old crippling fear. yes, that bitch.  at that moment, i wanted something, anything, in my life meant just for me to experience, on no one's terms but my own.

but back to the tree.  it was an average moment, really, centered around a less-than-average bit of foliage.  the sun wasn't particularly bright, there were no birds chirping in my ear, and all the little brats running around were bothering me just as much as they usually do.  had i not tried particularly hard to hide my wish in some obscure branch, nearly toppling over onto an unforgiving spaniard in the process,  i'm not sure i would have even remembered that the moment happened at all.

 not a week later i was home, and in the midst of my unpacking and americanizing and reuniting, the very thing i didn't know i was looking for grabbed me by the hand.  and not only did i receive what i wished for, but i let myself enjoy it without the usual appearance of my kamikaze alter ego.  

nothing forced, just an organic progression

...well, at least for a record amount of time.

while you're lucky if you get what you wish for, you're even luckier if it lasts.  and while it rarely does, whether or not it sustains itself isn't the important thing.  even if you get what you think you want most, and it falls through anyway, what counts is that you choose to appreciate the experience for what it was and that you take from it all that you can.  learn about yourself, the good and the bad, and about how you react to new situations and clusterfucks and inner turmoil. learn about others, learn from them and from their interests and their outlooks.  chances are, through all of this you'll also learn that the idea of "what you want" is an ever-evolving concept, and that what you wished for yesterday isn't what you would ask for if you had the chance again today.  

so what's the point of all this? who the hell knows.  take from it what you will, but if nothing else, remember:  just because you aren't getting exactly what you want doesn't mean you aren't getting anything at all.  

. . . 

sick of all this 'deep' nonsense? me too. 

the camera is finally charged, the party planning has begun, and free time is on the horizon.

actual fun stuff coming soon, pinkie swear.