Some mornings hit differently. Not because the sun looks any brighter, but because something small cracks open inside. Today it was an old photo from Google, showing me a girl with a quiet smile and wide eyes. I know what she was trying to hide behind that softness. I know how hard it was to smile like that. Looking at her now, I feel something I can’t quite name. Not shame, not regret. Just a gentle kind of distance, like remembering the shape of a song you no longer sing out loud.
There are moments I can almost reach her. She’s still in there, somewhere beneath the woman who has learned how to move carefully through rooms and conversations. Back then, I didn’t yet know how much would change. I wore everything on the surface, every feeling too close to the skin. It was exhausting, but it was honest. I don’t cry like I used to. That’s not wisdom. That’s just knowing which tears are worth the energy, and which ones won’t matter in the morning.
Familiar things stay even when everything else shifts. My eyes still search for meaning, for connection, for something that feels real enough to hold onto. What’s strange is that I don’t miss being young. I miss being unafraid of being seen. There was a time when I believed pain had meaning, that if I hurt enough, something good would come out of it. Now, I don’t always need reasons. I just want peace. I no longer chase explanations. I chase calm.
Years don’t teach you as much as they strip away. One by one, I let go of ideas, of people, of ways I used to walk into the world. It wasn’t dramatic. It just happened in small pieces. A conversation. A silence. A goodbye I didn’t know was final. Growth didn’t feel like blooming. It felt like breaking in places no one could see. I didn’t become better. I became quieter. And still, that girl remains with me, like a note tucked inside a pocket I keep forgetting is there.
Time softens what used to burn. I thought I’d mourn youth itself, but that’s not what aches. What I grieve is the openness, the vulnerability I used to carry so freely. It was risky, yes, but it made me alive. I look back and see someone who hadn’t yet learned to hold back. Someone who believed love could fix things. Someone who forgave easily, felt deeply, and expected too much. I don’t live like that anymore. But I remember her. She is not lost. She is still somewhere in me.
All photographs and content used in this post are my own. Therefore, they have been used under my permission and are my property.
