The End

Tomorrow I will turn 34. This post will be the last one for this blog. It's 6:30 am. It might take me all day to say the things I want to say before I go.

Or it might just be a five sentence post.

Who am I kidding? It will take me all day, even if it's not a very long post. Even if I don't get to say everything I want to say.

While I let the unknown take over for a little while there, I'm beginning to feel like I'm on my way back to the comforts of a well-designed life. If you had told me a year ago that I would be living outside of Istanbul in an idyllic suburb and working part-time as a preschool teacher and writing in my free time and lining my eyes with black eyeliner and wearing blush almost every day (more makeup than I wore during my days in sales!!), I would look at you with the blank stare I used to give my mother whenever she interrupted a marathon reading session.

So the unknown gave me a life I didn't imagine (I'm still imagining a bookstore in Bodrum where you can drink coffee and red wine, smoke cigarettes and eat chocolate chip/oatmeal bars all day.) Nevertheless, I'm living it and despite the sporadic hairloss, I'm content.

I'll be a novice preschool teacher for a while, a struggling writer, a not-so-Martha Stewart housewife who forgets to season, a not-so-hot wife who hates the gym, a not-so there daughter who doesn't call or a friend who doesn't remember birthdays.

However, while I'm living my not-so-perfect life, I will aim to notice people's eye color, the rhythm of their speech, the fragrance of each morning, the intensity of each raindrop and even whether I rest my wet umbrella to the right or left of my shoes before I enter the apartment.

In Eat Less Cottage Cheese and More Ice Cream, American humorist Erma Bombeck reflects: "If I had my life to live over again I would have talked less and listened more. But mostly, given another shot at life, I would seize every minute of it...look at it and really see it...try it on...live it...really exhaust it...and never give that minute back until there was nothing left of it."

So that's my goal. Whatever crisis life throws my way, the goal is to muddle through it in the same way I tackled this past year: being more aware, more engaged, more in-touch.

The final thought of the day was actually posted by Paulo Cuelho on his blog earlier today:

The Sufi tradition tells the story of a king who was surrounded by wise men. One morning, as they talked, the king was quieter than usual.

"What is wrong, Your Highness?" - asked one of the wise men.

"I’m confused," replied the king. "At times I am overcome by melancholy, and feel powerless to fulfill my duties. At others, I am dizzy with all power I have. I’d like a talisman to help me be at peace with myself."

The wise men - surprised by such a request - spent long months in discussion. In the end, they went to the king with a gift.

"We have engraved magic words on the talisman. Read them out loud whenever you are too confident, or very sad," they said.

The king looked at the object he had ordered. It was a simple silver and gold ring, but with an inscription:

"This will pass."

So it will.