Entropy claims everything in time. Appreciate now.

I'm leaving. Each conversation I have with loved ones here is punctuated by the knowledge that our time together here is finite. I will be gone in fewer than 6 months, in a new life, in a new state, with new loves and new dreams. I can describe these moments of realization as nothing more than bittersweet. Each time I visit Dandelion or Austin's, the thought occurs to me that this may be my last time stepping through these doors. How many more times will I walk in Leu Gardens? How many more times will I go to work at the studio? How many more hugs with my dad and sisters? How big will my nieces and nephew grow by the time I see them again? These are the bitter parts.

The sweetness exists in knowing that I'll find new cafes and new loved ones. Dare I say, I will even find love. I will have new jobs and I'll make new friends. I will learn new paths and find new gardens. I will be doing what I love in a city that loves what I do. Culture, art, and opportunity will be in my lap. These are the sweet parts.

I take the bitter and the sweet all in the same dish, hungry for it all. Each bite is delicious in its own right.

I'm so used to being overbooked and overloaded, overstimulated, so much so that invitations to events and time with friends became luxuries I could no longer afford. Now that school is done, a nuisance job is over, and my car was all but ripped from my hands, I am in a space with "free time". Time that I can freely say I'd like to spend with loved ones while I'm here. I was invited to spend a day with my old neighbors, a family that has grown and nurtured me over the years when my own was absent. The boy next door, Sean Paul, is coming home one last time with his fiance before they move to Germany, so I'm eager to meet her and to say goodbye.

I guess I can describe what I'm feeling as a fierce anxiousness to appreciate everything with a feeling of finality. I know that life won't stop here when I leave, but it will never be the same when I return to visit. Let me remember you all as you are. Nieces and nephew, stop growing so much; be small a while longer. Dad, stay young; I need you to be here forever. Sister, go be a doctor, but don't ever grow up; you're always a kid to me.

Love what and whom you have. That's all there is. There are no second helpings to this meal, and the leftovers never taste quite the same.