I’m in a stupor, lethargic with unclear roots. I’m not resistant to wisdom, but the thought of working to be wise triples my ambient weariness. I’m not off the hook. I borrow grief from the future. I’m decidedly grateful. The New Year’s festivities remind me of all the past years wherein I’ve proven that yes, each individual day and its minute decisions do add up to another massive brushstroke unto the picture of my one and only life, and no, it never feels like I’ve reached optimum glory.

The best year thus far has impacted the whole by way of a gradient, a delicate iridescence that adds the adjective “pretty” to my life’s list of general descriptors. I watch a religious message on blueprints of living hope and faith for 2025. It says hope is a magnet, and because hope is alive it must be fed. I’m minorly embarrassed by lazy acts that are human moments of rest at best and illustrations of sloth at worst. I have what I need to succeed because I have hope. I have everything I need to fail because I am capable of simply not moving.

At this angle, the future can be horror. I don’t know who will die this year. But it can also be puzzling, glittery, diagnostic, charmed, profound: travel awaits, friends are to be made, art is to be excavated in me, breakthroughs are inevitable if only because I’m too prideful and egotistical to quit trying. I know myself. I like myself. I love walking while listening to music. I hate my body and my face. I love my family and friends. I like food but in a complicated way. I yearn for the potent and indestructible creativity that only existed in my teen years, but am relieved to be unchained from all the angst. I can easily point to something beautiful and worship it, or worship as a response to it. Sometimes I let joy pass through me without molding my heart around its shape because I worry it won’t come back, so why save it a seat.

In 2024, I got married, signed my first indefinite lease, failed quietly at work, read 48 books, finished 3 journals. I had the best conversations of my life. I slept, and slept, and slept. Life peaked higher than it ever had, but also plateaued in curious ways. I’m always somewhere between reciting James Clear (“you don’t rise to the level of your goals—you fall to the level of your systems”) or Mary Oliver (“announcing your place in the family of things”), but also the opening monologue of Chappell Roan’s “Super Graphic Ultra Modern Girl.” I can honestly say I’m happy, but somehow that has a different meaning each time I declare it. I’m starting to realize that I’ve gotten used to making sure I declare it regardless of the circumstances. I’m happy in the same way I say: I’m a Filipina. I’m a girl. I’m right. This is right. I like myself at 7 AM but not so much at 3:44 PM.