Born & Raised - It All Comes On Without Warning

“I still have dreams, they’re not the same. They don’t fly as high as they used to.”

Sometimes I feel like I have completely wasted my time, like I’ve given up all that I could be and the time has passed. I am full of passion, gumption, thirst for life, or so I thought; I know exactly who I am, and then suddenly I don’t. Suddenly, I’m stepping down… down… down.

Down, backwards, regression, and depression. Born and raised - I’ve run out the clock. Well, I refuse to believe that I should ever be done with climbing, moving forward, progressing, and changing.

The questions of milestones and checkmarks: What do you do for work? Are you seeing anyone? When do you plan to have children? Some people let the continuous pursuit of these unchecked boxes force them into handing over a piece of their soul to worry. Worry? Why should I care!

They say our 20s are the most productive and memorable years of our lives. We step into adulthood, we fall in (and out of) love, we get married, we remain single, we raise kids, we raise ourselves. We are told to act our age (whatever that means) and we are told to live our lives (whatever that means). We sway with our decisions, we roll with the punches, we slide forwards and backwards. We travel, we look, we listen.

And that’s the best part about rock-bottom, it’s the furthest down you’re going to go. So, I may step down, down, down, but then I begin to climb, climb, climb. We learn when we live. We get back up, and we refuel our fire.

Then, snap! You find yourself alone just like you found yourself before. It’s an endless, indisputable cycle of repeated mistakes and lessons, and that’s all life really is.

My biggest flaw is that I tend to expect people to come in and keep me grounded, and feed me the “know me better than I know myself” flavored advice thus tickling my pallet with everything I want, nay need, to hear. It’s like I’m expecting cheat codes. Has life always been that easy for me?

I feel like I’ve always done so much that I’ve gotten bored and decide to cover my canvas with white paint and throw my brushes to the masses. Paint me! Show me something I can be! Play a song that I can sing! Make me feel as I am free!

Do it all for me! Speak for me!

It’s a hard crash when you realize that you are the only person able to make that decision. Thud. Damnit. Back to the bottom. Okay, get up…let’s climb.

I’ll always be on the hunt (read:prowl) for the next thing I’ll use to better myself. (Or is it to make myself feel better?) The next job, the next city, the next guy. I find something, but it’s too close to someone else’s reality. I chase my dreams and when I am feeling absolutely spent, I lay in self-reflection and awfully loud sighs. Pondering the what-ifs and wondering. I should be careful not to spend too much time in wonder. I tend to like something so much that when it suddenly becomes unattainable, I immediately shrug it off because if I keep my eyes peeled something similar, but still not the same, can be found from time to time. And I have plenty of that, don’t I?

No.

I’ll never be the doctor, the lawyer, the environmentalist, the nutritionist, the teacher, the mother, the lover.

Is it too late for all of that?

All at once it gets hard to take, it gets hard to fake what I won’t be. And I’ll tell you, swallowing that truth is painful. All the people’s voices stuck in your head, pulling you this way and that, are suddenly louder. Your mistakes scream louder. Your lessons carved so deep and the echo is louder. And you live less.

What is left of you to get back up when you spend all your time searching for a sign that's never gonna look the way you want it.

In times when I focus less on my career and explore my love life options, like really explore it. To a point where I want it all and I cannot possibly find that anywhere. For some, love is a noun, to others love is a verb. Yada, yada; it’s never enough.

I’ve come to learn that I strongly dislike when people take out their insecurities on me, as if my reality could use any more fog. I get offended. So, I find myself strongly attracted to overly secure people, people perhaps that are not meant for me, so that I do not have to deal with anyone’s bullshit. Maybe it’s because I want my self-doubt and my overly whimsical issues to be insurmountable, because when I find myself alone in my thoughts, such as the moment like this, who am I really writing it down for? Who is meant to read my bullshit?

Am I writing this for the lonely teenage girl who truly doesn’t care if she attends the prom? Am I writing this for the happy-go-lucky kid who deep down is an emotional wreck? Am I writing this for love, admiration, and affection? Am I writing this to save a life? Or am I simply writing this for me?

At the end of the day, when you're done with this world, you know the next is up to you.

I’m here to advocate for the climb, the many paths to follow up. Getting to know yourself better and better each time.

Yes I can be the doctor by mending broken hearts. I can be the lawyer by standing up for people, especially myself. I can be the environmentalist by promoting a green thumb print in my everyday life. I can be the nutritionist by cooking foods fresh from my garden. I can be a teacher by writing my story and sharing my experiences. I can be the mother by smiling with love. By loving unconditionally. I can be a lover by opening myself up to the love I deserve.

I can do it all. And just when I am walking home with no one left, speaking softly underneath my breath, “Hey world you ain’t seen nothing yet!”

Great, now it’s raining. That savagely fierce, indisputable cycle.

So, yeah, I feel like I lost. I feel like I failed. I feel like I’ve completely wasted my time.

But then I find her again, the Deanna who knows this is only the beginning, the Deanna who knows she is young enough to still unearth what is yet to be discovered; the girl who still has the passion, the gumption and the thirst for life that many people lose over time. So, where do I go from here?

Get back up. Climb.

Sway, roll, slide. Travel, look, listen.

Live and persist.

Write it down. Fuel the fire.

________________________________________________________________________________

I’m okay, I really am. I laugh at how quick I am to derail for shiny objects. At how much time I spend in wonder. I cackle at it, really.

You never look at me like I'm a liability, I bet you'd think I've never been at all.

I’m okay, I really am. Just fed up with feeling so born and raised. The feeling of wrapping something up for once scares me. That means it’s over. It’s like finishing your favorite book. The pages stop turning; that’s all there is, there isn’t any more. You’ve run out the clock. Time is of the essence is a phrase that only exists when there is a deadline.

And time is strange when you’re born and raised.