Shelley Pohl

22 realizations at 22.

I always thought that this type of yearly reflection was hoaky and hollow. Listening to middle class white girls take every Hallmark card ever created, claiming the contents as their own fleeting thoughts. Concepts they would ‘never’ think of again unless they looked back at their scribbled, tear stained inner monologue of basic wall decorations. I think the only time I’ve actually seen one of these lists outside of a pregnant high-schoolers Facebook feed, w

as on Tumblr, which isn’t a great look. Regardless, this year has caused a range of emotion that I thought was impossible. My heart has been inflated and deflated so many times that it will never make another balloon animal again. That plus being locked inside with no end in sight made me long to get my more reflective thoughts on paper. Just like those 7-months-along high school cheerleaders and the girls who turn to being angsty for attention, what I really want is to be able to, when things are joyous again, look back on how I felt in the midst of the bad and celebrate the fact that it was actually a time of growth. That my life is and was, at many times, thriving. It’s easy to get sucked into a whirlpool of pity and anger, gasping for air while being met with soggy disappointment. And honestly I don’t want to do that anymore. The world is in a state of disarray, but that doesn’t mean that my mind has to be. So with that being said,

1. Middle schoolers are hilarious if you actually give them the space to be.

2. Sometimes I take myself and my positions too seriously.

3. I use way too many sticky notes. To the point that I googled “a way to keep sticky notes organized and in one place” and my fiancé simply stated “notebook”.

4. It’s possible to absolutely hate a haircut and still rock it.

5. Things don’t go to plan at the exact moment when you desperately need them to.

6. Sometimes getting away is the opposite of what you actually need.

7. God’s plans are bigger and better than anything I could ever daydream.

8. Gas is expensive.

9. Your bridesmaids will not be the friends you pinky promised would be in the 10th grade.

10. My anxiety is real and severe, and that’s okay.

11. Mineral sunscreen is the worst thing ever. Don’t use it.

12. I am allowed to be angry.

13. Just because you are not proud of yourself, doesn’t mean those around you aren’t proud.

14. It’s not a matter of not having enough time, it’s a matter of just not wanting to do it.

15. Recognizing others bad qualities are a bigger motivator than the good qualities in them.

16. It’s okay to drop people out of your life without telling them why.

17. I’m actually glad that I never lived on a college campus.

18. It’s not impolite to ignore others opinions.

19. Some people will never let things go, but that’s not my problem.

20. I hate how good I am at ruining surprises just as much as everyone else hates it.

21. I wish for time to speed up because I am scared of the growth that wait time brings.

22. God answers wishes that you never thought to genuinely recognize.

I would now like to recognize that I am, in fact, a middle-class white girl, and although I did not peruse the card aisles to fill this page, I also know that a lot of these are lame, and filled with common sense. But isn’t that what common sense is? Things that you have to experience in order to fully understand? Applicable to most everyone but at completely different times? If you would have told me at 13 years old that at 22 I would realize that I was allowed to be angry, I would have thought you were the dumbest person in the world. Obviously me, a secretly angsty teen rebelling in her own mind against the Christian roots she was raised on, was allowed to be angry. But I don’t know if I actually believed that, let alone knew the full extent of what that meant, and how much freedom and peace sitting with that realization meant. Who knows, maybe the next time the world is frozen in fear and I am tired of my family wanting me to play Just Dance on the WiiU for the 500th time, longing for the ability to wander the aisles of Hobby Lobby, I’ll write another one of these and think “just turned 23 year old me had no idea what it meant to be angry”. Maybe instead I'll just have found the perfect way to sort my post-its.