One Decade In

Not long ago, my friend Abi Ramanan shared the following quote “There are decades when nothing happens, and there are weeks when decades happen.” It has certainly felt that way in 2020 where each week is dense enough to comprise a decade of living. For me, May 2020 marks one actual decade from when I graduated college in May 2010. Just before we graduated, my group of friends made predictions about where we’d be in ten years. We didn’t write them down, but I remember many of them and most have been wildly wrong. I know amongst our group of friends there has been more suffering than we bargained for, and more undeserved delights too. I would guess that we have more doubt than we used to, and maybe less whimsy, but also more courage, and, for me, a sense of awe about how marvelously life plods along and then bursts forth.

Sometimes when I’m paying attention and not too tired, I’ll lie in bed and think “if you would have told me when I woke up this morning that [unexpected event] would happen today, I would have said there is no way. But it did. It happened.” And somehow that encounter with the wondrous idea that our plans are no match for the day’s unfolding is enough to send me off into a night's sleep that, night after night, turns days into decades.