So now that I have my MFA the question comes, what do I do with the rest of my life? It’s strange because isn’t that the question I should be asking of myself every day when I wake up in the morning. How can I better myself? How can I accomplish a goal? How can I get from one moment to the next to the one after that and the one after that without falling apart? How do I make this day a better day, my life a happier life? The thing is there are small moments, and there are big ones.
Oddly enough, for a variety or reasons, a number of my friends seem to be feeling the same way. We are all at a point in our lives where something has ended. I think what we all need to remember is that when one moment or event ends, another begins. We mourn what we have lost, give it a final farewell, and move on.
It’s scary sometimes. We don’t know if we are moving on to something better or worse. We don’t know what the journey will entail, what treacherous pitfalls lie ahead or if we’ll be allergic to the flowers we do see, but this is the excitement of life. It is glorious to not know, because not knowing means discovery. It means adventure. It means that even though there is the potential for worse there is also the potential for better.
We take this chance because that is the beauty of life, it’s potential. To not chance is to stagnate, to wilt, to stay on the sidelines watching what every one else has while we let envy and bitterness and sadness swallow us. To not chance is to make excuses for why we cannot be better. To not chance is to die mourning what you never had without realizing that you never had the right to have it because you did not take that one step forward. I do not want my life to be a series of excuses. Yes the potential for worse waits, but even worse ends. To paraphrase:
Life is a series of highs and lows.
Those who fail most are also those who succeed.
If at first you don’t succeed try, try, try again.
Every rose has its thorns.
Every cloud has a silver lining.
The sun will come out tomorrow. And I can’t wait to see what it brings with it.
So, a toast to my friends. To life. To potential, and chance, and not making excuses. A toast to the yellow brick road, and all our tomorrows.
