31

Today is my birthday.

Lo and behold, the day began with a subtle tickling of my throat which by midday had blossomed to a full-rage sore throat. Needless to say, I took a sick day from work which would not have been my option of choice given the circumstances. Otherwise, I was not on my best behaviour today and I would gladly rewind the morning to give another performance in my personal life, a decidedly less grumpy performance: with every mistake, I learn.

As it figures, I do not have a great track record with birthdays in general. Most of them have been ordinary, devastating (20th birthday) or hardly memorable. I never had a sweet sixteen party. Come to think of it, I am not the party kind of gal, except that I did host a party last year to celebrate a housewarming slash 30th birthday party. Then, there was a birthday that I celebrated in a bomb shelter which has been the most fun I have had in retrospect.

Towards the evening, I decided to bake myself a birthday cake and my banana cake turned out to be quite delicious. Oh, I am slowly becoming quite the domestic goddess – all over again. To me, the art of baking a moist, old-fashioned cake is reminiscent of a bygone era and it fills me with warmth and fond memories. More and more, I am discovering that I enjoy the recreation of old family recipes and my mother’s Armenian baking cookbook is coming alive again.

As my life opens up to novel experiences, I embrace my 30s and the wild possibilities and whimsies they bring forth. All the same, I am grateful for my harrowing, fanciful, and passionate 20s that helped me ground myself to full circle. I hope you will join me for the ride.

Love,
Saro

Harried Fumblings

It is time to put the past to rest.

Call it introspective or melancholic, but I am the type of person to mull over a previous life, the diverging paths that former classmates and friends have taken. In this case, most of my 20s is fair game for the slightly neurotic and all-too self-deprecating girl in me. The years roll by, some life events occur, but my reaction to these crossroads may sometimes be more present in my consciousness than I would like.

Perhaps, this is all about me and my inability to forgive myself for disappointing my 18 year old self, but social networking sites like Linkedin taunt me a tad too much about people I may or may not know. In a way, glancing over his or her professional blurb makes me proud of the person I crossed paths with in college, L’s best-friend, or my old High School friend. It also puts me off somewhat for I abhor competition and type A personality like pursuits. So why play this game with myself?

It is time to embrace my beautiful and flawed life with all my might.

As I peruse in my Moleskine and around here, it feels like there is a common thread in my reflections. It is not one of contention or pity, but resilient hope that shines through again and again. In true form, I reflect intensely and fumble on forward in an attempt to live my authentic and joyous life. Life is good, life is really good. All the same, it is so effortless to be bogged down by uncertainty, self-doubt, and lethargy.

In essence, my soul is joyous yet there are certain habitual impediments that constrict my perspective sometimes. Therefore, the focus should be on creating my life map and living my life with pure abandon, a moral compass, and without regrets instead of recalling what else I should have accomplished, the graduate degrees I should have pursued (may still happen), or regretting any work-related decisions. I am snapping out of it with a smile on my face.

After all that is said and done, sometimes I just do not appreciate myself enough.

Renaissance

It has been quite the year.

Despite my long hiatus, I have been pondering on the art of writing  and my dwindling attempts at that endeavour during the past year. Indeed, the ever widening gap between passion, responsibility, and mere despondency has sheltered my thoughts from public view somewhat, but here I am again digging my quasi-obscure self out of its shell to try again.

Self-deprecating has always been a quiet blog despite garnering the attention of CBC News during its political soapbox heyday and it feels anti-climactic to explain my absence to my select few, but loyal stalkers. During the last year, I have been surrounded by preoccupations important and trivial, bliss in my personal life, and just mere distractions such as Twitter’s accompanying action game Spymaster which still fuels my interest despite latent disappointment with the hostile endgame of most players. Still, it is smart and almost as suave as that elusive of Her Majesty’s Agent Extraordinaire, Mr. Bond, and a wonderful time waster.

All the same, I have lacked the discipline to carve out a niche for my passions which is paramount to the blossoming of my soul and creativity. Instead, I have procrastinated and succumbed to the demands of the quasi-rat race. At a cursory glance, I feel like I have let myself down for not having lived with intention, but more as a drone lately, but things are looking up and hopefully, inspiration will decide to stick around the second time around.

Despite the lackluster of daily life, exciting things are happening, such as becoming a homeowner and seizing the day. Life is being created instead of being lived.

Welcome to my life.