Vicky and I were talking about our jobs, our lifestyle, our income. “But in the end, that really doesn’t matter,” she said. It’s all about being happy. If you can sustain your happy lifestyle responsibly, that’s what the goal is in the end. When she turned 30, she asked people older and more experienced, more financially established and what others would consider well-settled in life, “When you look back, what would you say it was all about?” They all said finding personal happiness. That’s the only true success, figuring out what makes you happy, finding a means to do it, and sustaining that. I think she’s come around to the thinking I had when I first started this blog. Discovering yourself and finding a way to “make yourself happy”, as my cousin Jennifer had once suggested to a bewildered version of me, and then having the faith to begin the first step in that direction, and the faith to continue until achievement, that’s true personal fulfillment.

I’m on the phone chatting with my childhood friend while casually typing this entry on my laptop on my bed, my cat’s snoring gently next to my bed. Mr. W and I ran 3 miles this morning (exhausting; PMS makes me anemic), hung out, watched “Friends,” took a nap, we had dinner, I went to visit the ‘rents, ate lots of cherries, and then came home. As much as nothing’s “wrong” with my life, I feel I’m a little short of my personal best right now. I’m lacking the initiative for that first step. But the age ticking is putting a new sense of urgency into me.