25, you taught me so much I think I missed the lesson. [10.26.2020][3347]

I never thought of my birthday as anything special. It’d always been a day in the year that would push me closer to adulthood and further away from my childhood. Then it became a day where I could go and buy alcohol legally and not be embarrassed.

Now it was just a day. It never had much sentiment to me and it devalued even more once my grandmother and aunt passed away.

But experiencing 2020 taught me something: life is worth living and I’m worth the celebration.

For the first time in forever I actually indulged on myself. Not by buying things to fill a void or participating in events so people won’t think I’m soulless, but actually celebrating me.

As I rung in my 24th day I felt that I should say what is on my mind. And that simply put was that, I am Jocelyn. With the biweekly existential crisis I had and my lack of faith in humanity (and sometimes myself), I forced myself to pause and reevaluate what it was that I wanted and what I wanted others to get from the experience with me.

I had this bad bitch quote written for my birthday caption on Instagram but as I sat doing my makeup and watching Maid in Manhattan I realized I just don’t give a fuck.

The caption was “The people who mumble your name in private never have the balls to speak in a crowded room” and when I came up with this I thought I came up with fire. I was yelling fuck you to the naysayers, the haters, and the people who doubted me. I was telling my depression and anxiety to go eat a big bowl of fucks. But I realized it wasn’t about any of that.

It was about me. I needed to stake my claim in my life. I had to become the main character in my own story. Normally, I took comfort in being the background character, the supporting sidekick, the therapeutic friend.  But it began to feel uncomfortable; like I could be that but so much more.

And then I turned 25.

I prayed for the removal of things and people from my life that weren’t for me. I begged the universe and God for clarity as I entered this new stage in my life. Crying silently at night asking to be the person I knew I was supposed to be, free of all the emotions that plagued me when I was awake.

And they listened. I lost 80% of my friends, got my first apartment, and began to like myself a little more than I usually did. The facade of Jocelyn that existed before was no longer a version of myself I didn’t know. I felt more solidified in myself. More stable, more grounded, more… me— ?

And yet in the same breath I took the peace and the growth and built a new cocoon.

Covid made it easy to forget the world existed because it was a simple equation: work, home, sleep, again. Work. Home. Sleep. AGAIN.

My days filled with music as I drowned out the world in my commute to work quickly turned into days in my home singing loudly as I cooked breakfast. Work felt less like a chore and more like an accomplishment as I sat on the furniture I worked hard to save money for. Sleep wasn’t something I needed to reset the day and make me want more, it was a refresher before a new day.

Then the days begin to string together and my home became the only place I knew of. My office, my club, my Starbucks, and my bedroom. Everything flowed together like a spiderweb and I looked up and I was 26.

I didn’t…. Exist if that makes sense. I was put away neatly for my own protection against the things I begged to be removed from me. The things I cried about, to friends, to myself, to my pillow. I felt scared. To be in the world I used to detest. The world that I felt too strange to exist in. And now here I am. Looking back at the last year in admiration and utter confusion.

Confusion because I existed without living yet again.  26 gave me lesson, for sure, but twenty six made me confront something that I thought I’d realized. I don’t know me. At least not well enough. The version of me that I knew of was strong,  certain, and didn’t need anyone or anything all while secretly needing everyone and everything. I knew I needed the support, the validation, the encouragement to keep going. And yet it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t valid.

Begging for ammunition from people who didn’t have it or didn’t have their best foot forward in life; in our relationship. I was begging, pleading, and demanding more from people when I didn’t even have it myself.

So I spent a year in solitary hoping to gain some clarity. Some understanding on who and what it was that I needed and the only thing I could discern was that I needed no one. Wanted nothing. Needed everything.

26 gave me lessons I still can’t comprehend. Even with the year of more, even with the year of less. I’m still learning: about myself, about my life, about my existence. But at least I’m trying, right?

See you at 27,

Jo 🖤

I lost hope. In myself, in the world, in others. Because somewhere along the path life began to twist and turn and wreak havoc on my innocence.

I lost faith. In the future, because of my past, no longer in the present. Because of words that formed together to create a litany of deceit.

I lost myself. In society, in my head, despite all that I’d worked for. Simply because I was too afraid to allow myself to be free.

I am at a loss of words. Because I lost hope and faith and myself. Truthfully because I was too afraid to be free in this world that gave me a litany  of words of deceit that wreaked havoc on my innocence.