The messy in between

I haven’t written much about the phase of transition I’ve been living through for the past several months. Outgrowing old things and growing into new. Dreaming of what the future could hold for so long, then actually watching the events happen in front of me. It’s slightly surreal. Moments I’ve dreamed of happening for years are finally starting to become tangible. While I’ve been moving and breathing in the momentum, fixating on the future and occasionally glancing back to see where I’ve been, I have to keep reminding myself to be where my feet are. Be here. In this moment that I find myself in, this moment of transition.

My room is a mess, I have piles of laundry that either need washed or folded. I have a stack of totes with thrifted things waiting for a future apartment kitchen. There are a collection of mugs on my dresser with remnants of coffee still in the bottom that I need to wash. My bed is unmade, and beside me, I have a full to-do list. I have important papers I can’t lose and books piled high that I still have yet to read. There’s no more room on my shelf yet I keep buying more, something is comforting about bring a new book home during a transition phase, finding comfort in the beautiful colors of the cover, the lengthy prose, the hope that one day I’ll be able to soak in all the words, wisdom, and perspective of many other people.

As I write this it is a quarter to 9 am and I have to start work soon, but in these few minutes, before I transition over my thought from this to that, I want to hold this space open. Receive where I was and where I’m headed, but focusing on the now. This messy transition, let it come what may and teach me what it has to know. I cried the other night, not because I’m not grateful, but because the overwhelming sense that life is changing and I’m in the thick of it is just a lot to process all at once while you lay in your bed alone at midnight. It’s okay to be sad sometimes, even when everything is happy. It’s okay to simultaneously miss the way things were when you were 15 but still look so much towards the way things will be when your 30. It’s okay to grieve the past while looking forward to the future. This is what transition looks like, for me. This is the messy in-between.