a promise

I’m at a stage of life where growth is inevitable. It's fast and sometimes appears without us knowing of its arrival. 

Its abrupt hellos and goodbyes are now beginning to feel like a routine I should be accustomed to. Saying “we have five years left” suddenly turned into “next year”.

The places you thought you would never leave, you have left. 

The people you thought you would spend the rest of your life with, have parted. 

The memories you thought would never fade, have started to dim. 

And you realize that the future isn’t as far off as you think it is. It's scary, I know. 

But as the year reaches its finale, and the last eleven months start to dwindle away, I have to say that even when you feel the sudden anxiety over how fast time flies, how distance grows, or how different everything has become; always remember that you have survived all the things you thought you wouldn’t. 

One day, we’ll all have separate lives. Those we hold closest will slowly, but surely have lives in new places, with new people, and it’ll be strange for a while. 

It won’t be the same, and that’s okay. 

For now, despite the distance, the stress, the work, and the extra effort needed to just be there, let’s promise to be home for the summer. 

Once we’ve grown, we won’t have as much of each other in our futures as we once did in our pasts. But once a year, every year, during the period of time when we would feel most alive, let’s come home and live like we did when we were growing together. 

Let’s bask in the comfort of the sun, enjoy each other’s company in the horrible traffic, order way too much food, and cherish all the usual things we do, for as long as we can do them. 

That way, growing apart and growing up doesn’t have to seem as heartbreaking anymore.