I'm really not into oversharing these days. Or sharing at all if I'm being honest. As someone who started this journal 17 years ago, I am struck by the years I spent pouring my heart out on the internet. I love that I have entries from 19 year old me to re-read and in many ways relive the person that I was then. But while I love the memories I have to forever look back on, I also struggle to journal and compose thoughts publicly at 36. I feel more protective over my words and my life experiences more than ever despite wanting to write my every thought down and connect with people who still care to read them.
There is this brilliant moment in my favorite show Fleabag where the main character who spends the entirety of her 2 season arc breaking the fourth finally decides she no longer wants or needs to do that. Prior to the last few minutes of the show, she constantly looked at the camera (us) (her audience) to share her inner most private thoughts even if they make her look awful. Fleabag saw us watching her fuck up relationships, and mourn her best friend and mom and fall in love and make a complete ass out of herself all the while letting us in on the journey with a slight glance or smirk to the camera. She was messy yet lovely and every glance towards the camera felt like an inside joke between shared friends.
But then she falls in love and she starts to heal and she is still messy and troubled and a little slutty and crude but she's finally on the path to being okay and accepting whatever life has in store for her. So after two devastatingly beautiful seasons of allowing us in, and breaking the forth wall and having an audience of peers to look after her... she takes one last glance at the camera, wishes the audience goodbye with a smirk and walks away. And you don't feel bad (sad but not bad) in this moment because you were just happy to walk alongside her as she worked through her shit for however long she needed us there for.
And if I can be honest this feels like that point in my life in regards to Everything Was especially as I struggle to write or even attempt to maintain an online journal. I can't tell you the number of entries I have started and then abandoned because I just wanted to experience the emotion or event rather than documenting it. And not just here...on every social media platform I have no desire for exposure. I have no desire to make sense out of everything at every turn. I am enjoying just existing, however painful and beautiful that is. And because of this, I just want to soak up everything slowly and quietly. I barely use any form of social media anymore because I don't feel the need to share everything as much, if at all. I also so desperately wish to protect the good and bad moments because I am more equipped to deal with them head on and with the support systems in my day to day life. And while I do have mostly great things happening in my life (new job, new apartment, and an adorable new kitten named Langston ) and one not so great thing (grief) I want to handle them with care and tenderness because for once in my life I feel capable of doing so.
Which is hard to finally admit since I started this journal at 19. This journal is almost as old as I was when I first sat down to type my first entry. I was a socially anxious, depressed college sophomore who had no friends and a crippling addiction to the Sims at the time. I was also painfully alone with no one to share my thoughts with during moments where I needed someone to share them with. And this continued consistently for almost two decades. Something would happen and I would want (almost need) to share it with my unseen friends (you) because I knew you all where there supporting me through every embarrassing and sometimes lovely moment. I wanted to bring you all on the journey as messy and chaotic and sad as it was because you all made me feel seen when I was at my most shattered.
But as I continue to share less and less and less of myself online I realize it's because I am growing up and healing and loving and being loved and that maybe, just maybe, I am okay enough to exist and figure IT out as everything comes to me. I am still a bit shattered by life and confused and shy and sometimes insecure but I am also incredibly lucky in a lot of ways for the things I do have and the life i am living that continues to surprise me. I love and feel worthy of love like never before and I can't thank you all enough for caring for me when I didn't think I was capable of either.
So is this goodbye? I don't know but it definitely feels like a glance towards the camera, with a comforting smirk to let you know that I am okay and that your presence has meant the world to me. It definitely feels like a wave that says thank you and I love you and that I hope we meet again. You all reminded me every day that I wasn't alone and even though it's time for me to exist and live out of frame I am grateful every day for this space that allowed me to find a path forward towards healing. I am grateful that I had the opportunity to share my best and worst self with you. But it's now my turn to live outside the lens I created and become an unseen but supportive friend. It's my turn to be present in my life and quietly observe from afar when and if you need me, for however long that is.
And for the people who walked alongside me for so long I can't thank you enough, you will always be home to me. This space will forever be home.
Until we meet again,
Beckett Amelia Hughes.
