January 2023

exactly 15 days ago I underwent one of the scariest and most humbling 47 minutes of my life.

if you’ve never experienced a head CT scan, allow me to walk you through it.

you have to sit perfectly still in a painfully narrow, white tube (that can barely fit an adult); with a helmet over your head that successfully ads to the overflowing sense of panic, otherwise known as claustrophobia; all the while you’re forced to listen the loudest, most bizarre alien machine sounds barraging through your ear drums.

you’re alone, you’re scared shitless and you find yourself negotiating with yourself, with God, and some other God, just to be ok.

you think to yourself, “stupid ungrateful brain, do you know how many books I read for you? I thought we were a team.”

but, time flows, as time does,
and after 47 minutes (or was it 3 hours?) you get out thinking the worst has passed, at least that’s what your girlfriend tells you, and now all you have to do is wait…
for 14 agonizing days.

you are now Schrödinger’s cat, meow.

imagine watching a dubbed movie where you can still hear the original audio in the background, barely above a whisper,
that whisper becomes your daily internal voiceover, only yours is yelling, so much so that you can’t actually hear the dialogue anymore.

the googling, the worrying, the ever-present fear…

the one thing you cherish most about yourself, your imagination, turns against you, building worst case scenarios faster than you can stop them,
of course you know you shouldn’t, of course you do it anyway.
stupid brain.

from the second you do that scan, anxiety becomes your daily affirmation.
every day becomes a mix of desperation and hope.
every day you try to forget, and not to forget.
your mind has a mind of its own.

after exactly 14 days, with your girlfriend’s hand in your hand,
you log in to see your results.

relief

“sometimes I wish I could save you from your mind” she says.

me too babe, me too.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

today is day 19 of the year, there are 346 days remaining of 2023.

they say you make your own luck,
do you make your own bad luck as well?

they say there are things that happen before the bullet hits the body…
warning signs, opportunities to escape, chances to fight back,
maybe.
maybe you’re just a confused tourist that’s taken a wrong turn.

for the last few weeks I’ve worked on planes, boats, trains and buses,
I’ve held meetings in hotel lobbies, cafes and coworking spaces.
I’ve traveled between countries and cities, castles and churches, restaurants and museums.

I’ve been working remotely for 12 years and I’m still shocked at how remote my work really is.
how much privilege and good fortune,
how much freedom.

and yet,

across the world sits a woman just like me,
just as motivated, skilled and able,
with the same work ethic and love for her family.

I hope to never forget or take for granted that the only difference between the two of us is the passport.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

today is day 15 of the year, there are 350 days remaining of 2022.

the romans, the mayans, the mongols…

entire civilizations minimized to one word in dusty history books.

everything fades, yes, even you.

so why hesitate? why sulk? why seek revenge?

what are you putting off doing out of fear?
what is it costing you?
what if nothing ever changed?
what are you waiting for?

ideally you should do some of these things before you decide to settle down and get 4 credit cards.

and if pure inertia fails, remember…

every problem can be solved through one of these three solutions:

• accept it
• change it
• leave it

if you can’t accept it, change it, if you can’t change it, leave it.

most of life’s hardships come from our inability to make one of these decisions.

so make one.

signed,
the millennial.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

today is day 11 of the year, there are 354 days remaining of 2022.

“don’t eat the yellow snow,”

I saw this golden piece of advice written on a postcard and chuckled to myself at how childish and ridiculous it was.

seeing how I’m currently galivanting through the Baltics at sub zero temperatures, that indeed sounded like pertinent advice.

I filed it for later use.

every once in a while I’d see a dog walking through the snow and, as if Pavlov himself had conditioned me, I remembered to giggle.

“don’t eat the yellow snow,”
bwah!

today I boarded a ferry that washed me away from cold and dark Helsinki to cold and dark Tallinn.
I’ve had spiced mulled wine and hot chocolate with Baileys,
I’ve carried half my body weight on my back for most of the day and am now sat in my hotel room, overlooking a frozen river who’s name I can’t pronounce, listening to my partner’s rhythmic snoring, thinking about yellow snow…

most of my life I’ve been trying to convince myself of some deeper truth, when there wasn’t one.

we’re all different the same way,
navigating many competing obligations and distractions,
living through each other’s point of view because we fear not being accepted,
explaining, understanding and justifying everything in order to feel safe and important.

and yet, all we want is to know that it’s going to be alright in the end.

lighten up, it’s not that deep.

just don’t eat the yellow snow.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

today is day 8 of the year, there are 357 days remaining of 2022.

congratulations! you made it through another
year,
12 months,
52 weeks,
365 days,
8,760 hours,
525,600 minutes,
31,536,000 seconds.

buckle up,

today is day 1 of the year, there are 364 days remaining of 2023.

I’ll see you tomorrow.