The news groans on as the background noise to my morning. I paint my face confident. Caffeine enters my bloodstream, and my eyes widen just enough to finish my mascara. I slip into the shoes I bought in the junior section of Kohls and shrug into my worn sweater.
As 7 am rolls around, I load into my car with my oversized bag, coffee, and lunch tote and turn on the radio. My morning commute commences.
Read MoreI began to lose touch with so many of my friends. I’m sure you’ve heard something similar to the “you find out who your real friends are when you move away” banality before. Sure, sure. Of course it’s true. Relationships take multiple levels more effort when you can’t just show up at a friend’s house with a bottle of wine and an itemized list of issues for which they already have context.
Read More“I want you guys to go, I’m just going to take a breather and hang out on my own for a bit,” I say. It’s the truth—when I feel myself getting into one of these moods all I want to do is be alone, not tear anyone down with me. But even in knowing that, I can’t pretend this isn’t a version of myself I don’t get along with. I spiral myself further down the rabbit hole, feeling awful for letting my friends down, berating myself for not being fun for them.
Read MoreThe truth is, when we put stock in something as changeable as the weather, we are setting ourselves up for disappointment. In high school, I looked forward to college. In college, I lived semester to semester waiting for the next new thing. And now, the next new thing is less certain. It’s hard sometimes to settle into the present without imagining a better alternative.
Read MoreI thought my dream job would mean covering crimes happening next door, not my desk-neighbor’s missing hot sauce and the ensuing bitter retorts tossed about the room. I thought it would mean focusing on the world around me, not Spyin’ Bryan two desks down that liked to write down and track every move I made. (He would then send that info to my boss, as if my bathroom break was going to ruin the whole operation.)
Read MoreI have come home every day for the last three weeks exhausted. My feet aching, my ankles covered in blisters from shoes that I believed to be comfortable but have thus far betrayed me, my back damp from sweating on the subway platform and my hair frizzy from the humid city air. (Gross, I know. I’m a vision.)
Read MoreI have a small poodle named Bella. She is scared of most things, and I do mean most things—the wrinkle of a grocery bag, the sound of her collar tag clanging against her food bowl, men—all these and more send her into a fit of shivers. Though the clinking of dishware doesn’t send me into fight-or-flight mode, I can relate to this pup saturated like a soggy sponge with fear and anxiety.
Read MoreI need to cry. It’s not the kind of cry that comes out in laboured sobs and makes people around you feel genuinely uncomfortable as they watch the world end on your face. It’s the kind that comes when you reach the end of your grief: acceptance.
Read MoreAt 25, I’ve officially crossed into the territory where more of my friends are married than not, and many are starting to have children of their own. I can’t even commit to more than a two-week long affair with a particular variety of Fernet–or rather, it can’t commit to me. As a rule, I don’t like to spend much time considering feelings of lack, but I’ve begun to notice that an absence of partnership gnaws at me more mornings and evenings than I’d like to admit.
Read MoreWindrose is everything you (and I) could hope for in a magazine. It is a collection of real stories we can all relate to in some form or fashion. It’s for those currently in the throes of adulthood—facing new challenges, covering uncharted territory, grieving past phases—and learning to carve out a life all their own. It’s a unifying, uplifting work of words and art that continues to remind me of one very important thing:
Despite my endless doubts and fears and insecurities, I’m not alone.
And neither are you.
Read MoreAs confident as I had been in my decision at the time, walking away from my glamorous magazine job—and along with it, my lifelong “dream” career—left an emotional scar that refused to heal, no matter how many times I told myself it was for the best. A year later, I was still feeling an incredible amount of doubt. Perhaps, even, a tinge of regret. And because I was scared of what people would think, I refrained from talking (or writing) about it.
Read MoreLooking back on the artifacts of our good times together has shown me that it is alright to let go of the friends I have lost. Allowing them to travel down the paths they have chosen, without holding a grudge, is part of embracing their complexities.
Read MoreI was describing my new apartment to one of my coworkers when he said, quite poetically, "You have an apartment, but not a home." He was right—I was in the middle stages, in that I had a key, I had a lease, and there were half-opened suitcases scattered about my room, but I didn't have any furniture, I didn't have a bed, or even hangars.
I very much was in the process of creating a home.
Read MoreGrowth is slower and more subtle than I used to think it was. It doesn’t always look like milestones or hurdles jumped, and it’s hard to document. My journal pages from the last two years don’t look all that different from each other; there aren’t huge leaps made from one day to the next. But over the months, my voice reads a little happier. A little more hopeful for the future.
Read MoreYou, who are moving away from the place that has been home for the last four years and are afraid of finding community in your new city: you are not alone. You, who are applying endlessly to jobs, frustrated by applications that receive no response and interviews that get you nowhere: you are not alone.
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