Hello, Twenty-Eighteen

Six months ago I didn't think I'd ever be able to write those words. The world stopped and my life froze. I couldn't see a past, or a future, just a sea of nothing stretching out before me. But here we are now, in January. I get up and get dressed. I go out to buy coffee. I walk my dog and go to work. Normal things that normal people do that not so long ago felt impossible. The fact everything just keeps going even when you're standing still is comforting to me. It's okay to jump off the conveyor belt for a while if you need to and the world will be there waiting when you get back. I know I'll never be the same person again and my life, my future experiences and the things I love will always be affected by this past year, but that's how it is now. Normally I'd take this time here on the internet to reflect back on a year's worth of achievements and successes, but 2017 is something I wan't so firmly behind me now that nothing sticks out as being worthy of remembering. So instead I want to look forward to a new year. Midnight on January 1st seemed like any other passing moment to me, rather than a clean slate starting. But I know it's there, like a bookmark in the middle of a page.

This week I went out with a roll of 35mm film and a beaten up old Olympus camera and had the most fun I've had in a long time taking photos. The difference between filling my phone's Camera Roll with shot after shot then flicking through afterwards to find the perfect photo, to having just one chance to get things right was such a change. But those really are moments captured and ones that I now have physical copies of instead of being stored via pixels on an app that I'll never scroll that far back on anyway. These shakey, unfocused shots have a long way to go but I like them and definitely want to keep shooting on film this year. As for the rest of my goals for the next twelve months, I'm going to keep them loose. I want to have more fun than I've let myself have in a long time. Not let oppertunities pass me by because I spend too long overthinking them, and I want to fall in love again. Maybe with something I've never tried before, maybe with myself, or even someone new. Who knows. I still hold onto hope that I will be happy again, even if it's in brief moments when something makes me laugh, or smile, or times when I just simply feel content.