Naomi

I am going to be 20 years old in eight days. I am so ready for it. I’m ready to not be called a teenager anymore and ride high on a wave of maturity. I don’t mean maturity in the sense of paying bills and working specific hours and eating my five daily servings of fruits and vegetables. I mean it more in the sense of perspective: knowing that when some shit happens, it will eventually pass and I will feel better one day and love myself even more and find some confidence.

Confidence means I can be approached by someone without wishing the ground would swallow me up. It means not having those self-conscious prickles all over my body. It means opening up, not closing off. It means being free.

I knew the tide had turned for me emotionally when I got my hair cut and could finally dance naked again. It’s not that this way is good and the other way I am is bad. Wanting to be touched and not wanting to be touched are two sides of the same coin. The tides are always turning, but I’ll enjoy this way while it lasts.

I am going to be an adult in the greatest sense of the word. The word means the only limits on me are the ones I choose for myself. ♦