The flickering glow of the candlelight on almost twenty-something candles.Â
Blow out the candles and make a wish.Â
Wish for a new shiny car, wish to win the lottery, wish for your dream wardrobe. This year, I wish to be satisfied, not living in the past and comparing my life to others around me. I tend to get sad on my birthdays, never wanting to get older than I am, longing for the days of Neverland (you know, “the second star to the right”), wishing for Peter Pan to fly me away with “faith, trust, and pixie dust”. The truth is, I think I don’t want to know the truth. I think the secret is that aging doesn’t have to be about loss but about transformation.Â
The truth could be that while Neverland offers eternal childhood; real life offers something different that can’t be obtained through storybooks (not even fables). It may not be as entertaining, but it is equally valuable: depth, growth, and the fullness that comes from experiencing all seasons of life. Perhaps the most meaningful birthday wish isn’t to stop time but to be fully present within it.Â
Last Friday, April 4th, I celebrated my 19th birthday, my last teenage birthday. It isn’t such a drastic jump from 17 to 18, but it was just as scary to me. And you know, for the first time in a long time, I wasn’t sad; the only feeling I felt was love, deep love. Love from my friends, and family, and everything in between. I had an epic birthday bash (as usual) and the only thing the night was filled with was laughter, dancing, and wonderful birthday wishes.Â
I wish for this to be the start of a new outlook and new chapter in my life, where I stop mourning the simple days but be grateful I had them and learn to embrace the new, exciting, complex feelings that come with growing up, after all we’re never really that far from “the second star to the right.”