Eva LaBeau

I’m entering a new time in my life in which everything is set to change, and that’s okay.

The thing about innocence is that it’s only there for a moment before it mocks us for trying to regain what we’d had before everything changed. 

The memories of childhood naivety and a hopeful aptitude for life as a whole fade into a mere recollection of the way things were but no longer are.

That’s innocence: We hold onto it with every fiber of our being, only to be made to grow into something more. 

We have to grow up. 

We have to enter the real-life world and leave our idealistic versions of the way the world works.

It’s a rite of passage, in a way—the end of the beginning. 

And, in that moment, it all becomes too much. 

I don’t want to grow up. 

I don’t want to fail.

I don’t want to sit idly while the world passes me by. 

And that’s a terrifying thing to the little girl inside who chooses to see the absolute best in the world. 

But it’s okay because I’m finally learning that I’m not meant to understand it all. I’m not supposed to follow every detail of life with the vigilance that I tell myself I should. 

I never will understand it all, and I’m beginning to accept that. 

The world is a beautiful and convoluted place, and that’s amazing. 

This is my senior year of high school. The first major era of my life is coming to an end, only to be followed by another beginning—one that I am not fully prepared for myself—that will pave the way for the next era in its entirety. 

That terrifies me—it’s like a shout into the void, completely unknowing of what is to come. 

There’s a vulnerability and delicateness that comes along with it, slowly but surely forcing me to question whether I really should trust it. But the truth is this: If everybody has to face life, then I do too. 

If nobody can simply opt out and choose a different path, then I can’t dwell on the fact that I can’t either.

I know that mortality is inevitable and pain is undeniable and improvement in life is not a linear path.

But I also know that some of the most incredible things come without any prior expectation. 

My journey is my responsibility, and that is a beautifully terrifying idea.

I know that there’s much more to come following the end of this era. 

Welcome to the end of the beginning.