Mid-December of what we now call last year, I got a hankering to dive deep into my well of self. As I’ve had a blog since 2006, it’s relatively easy to fall head first into my past. Posts about my early years in New York City, 23 years old, discovering a world of online writing, photography and recipe sharing. I uncovered a Flickr account I posted 138 pictures on and then fully forgot about. It was a delight to recall my baby self in the midst of forming her identity. Building the foundation upon which now sits the whole house of my life.
Something ignited in me as I set up my dig site, got out my tools to dust off old memories, carefully began to uncover moments long buried. I viscerally remembered what it felt like to be excited. Youthfully exuberant. Empty of wisdom, full of enthusiasm. It was like chugging a cold glass of water at 2 in the morning. When I look at these pictures, I can quite literally feel, bristling through my body and over my skin, the thrill I had to be alive.
Youth is wasted on the young has never rang so true. But then I think of the 90 year old I once served who I’d assumed wasn’t a day over 60. She told me she had no idea how she was 90, she didn’t feel it, barely paid attention to it. She was excited for her upcoming trip to Alaska. That she turned her back on the number of age and kept walking forward into life unknown with the excitement of a child, has always stuck with me.
It’s time to recapture the buzz. Infuse my life with the bubbles of discovery. Appreciate the fact that, although aliveness was coursing through my 20-something veins, so was fear and paralyzing insecurity.
The eight years I spent living in Los Angeles, ages 28-36, saw me 60 pounds lighter than I am today. Currently, I’m in a place where I’m concerned with getting in shape but completely unbothered by my weight or how I look. That I spent my LA era thinking I was fat, tortured by the fact that I could never seem to narrow my hips or shave off my ass. Constantly on a cleanse, a new workout program, at all times on a quest to lose ten pounds. My goodness, I sigh, that poor little baby couldn’t relax for a second.
New York City is a most treasured chapter for me and stumbling upon my old Flickr reminded me as much. This was a time when all was possible. When I was fully in love with my best friends, theatre, being drunk and literally playing. We would stay out forever, run block to block. Smoke cigarettes and bundle up in the cold. I love that I lived in The City. I love the version of myself who moved there. I wonder when and why she got so serious, became obsessed with all she didn’t have yet, impatient and frustrated and sad.
Sometimes I wonder if my fizziness would still have flattened had I never moved to Los Angeles. But the buildings suddenly seemed to trap me. I was claustrophobic and bothered. Sunny California was alluring and a better place to pursue my acting dreams. Dancing in the living room at 3am wasn’t really a thing anymore, maybe we’d all grown out of it by then.
I’m a big believer in opposition. That in order to understand something fully, you must also experience it’s opposite. For joy to feel potent, one must have felt despair. A glimmer of hope resides somewhere in my soul wishing one day for us all to exist in a state of peace void of the necessity for its opposite but that’s the woo woo piece I keep out back. I try to brush and feed her as regularly as my realistic side will allow. What I’m getting at is a recognition that I’m ready to invite baby Brittany back to the party. The girl who was thrilled just to take a damn picture. Who got off on testing new recipes, tried her best to dress like Carrie Bradshaw and bounced around with joy simply to be awake.
There’s something to be said for the mystery of it all. Choosing excitement over frustration about the unknown. With wisdom comes awareness. A consciousness of choice. I am allowed to and can inject my life with youthful exuberance whenever I want. Be in love and drunk and playful all the time.
It’s weird to be 41. There’s a distinct awareness that time marches on, that I’ll continue to get older and so will everyone around me. There’s an existential sickness to it. But oppositely there’s a stable comfort in having lived years and learned that the mysteries of life do get solved only to be replaced by more questions.
How big can my house get? How many more stories can I add? It feels like the sky’s the limit. This familiar, bubbling innocence I’m so happy to welcome home. Fossils of youth uncovered and brought to the mantle of my present. I’m so happy to pick them up and hold them, let their magic seep into my middle-ish age.
Who knows where time actually goes but into the memories of our past. These wells of collected moments that inform who we become. It’s very cool to be able to look at old things from a place of safety and self-assurance, to make sense of feelings that, at points in my life, seemed to threaten my very existence. There’s comfort in the knowledge that, at some future point, this exact post will be evidence of a time when I knew less. That the spiral of life will continue to spin and I will delight in the artifacts that have gotten me to where I am today.
LISTENING
How I Built This. I’ve heard talk of this podcast for years but never listened until my sister-in-law recommended it. I’m fully obsessed. Makes me see how successful people are just humans who kept going, moved through failure and simply never gave up. V v v inspiring.
BAKING
These sourdough waffles I make about once every two months on our mini waffle maker and freeze like Eggos. They’re a great way to use your discard and having homemade waffles in the freezer is very chic.
DOING
As I mentioned, I am riding a wave of fitness motivation. I am determined to gain the ability to do a push-up and make it look easy by the end of this year. I’ve been doing the FREE 12 week programs from Heather Robertson on YouTube and really loving it. If you’re looking for a structured workout plan, I highly recommend her.
Hello to so many new subscribers who’ve found me through my brilliant friend
! I’m grateful to welcome you here and also to know that you subscribe to and read someone as powerful and intelligent as her. I will never stop singing her praises or showering her work with gratitude.Alan and I celebrate three years together this Friday and are headed to the mountains for our anniversary this weekend. Absolutely wild how quickly the years fly by when you’re spending them with your best friend. I hope we get snow!
As always, I’m wishing you a lovely week and hoping you are taking the very best care of yourself and the people and animals you love. I’m sending you my gratitude and joy for a good 2025. Paid Subs, see you Wednesday for the first Sweet Tea Talk of the year!
