Day26

On days when I’m bored, or really have little to nothing to do, I’ll find my high school yearbook, wipe off the dust and sift through the pages.

I’ve had this book for eight years and have basically memorized its contents from cover to cover, yet every time I look at it, it brings a smile to my face. From the “messages” written by everyone to how young we looked in the pictures, the yearbook serves as a reminder of days past and how far we’ve come in what seems like, no time at all.

I always make a point to go though the senior class portraits. Class of 2000! As I go row by row, I often wonder what each person is up to and where they are in life. I was one of the ones who left for college and didn’t look back. I didn’t keep up with many of my classmates and probably wouldn’t recognize a lot of them if I passed them on the street.

However, some of those smiling faces I see are gone now. Some have been killed over drugs, a couple have died in car accidents, others couldn’t overcome sicknesses. These smiling faces that are no longer were of people I knew a least seven years, some more. I “grew up” with them, played with them, went to class with them.

They were all my age, born in 1982.

I turned 26 today. Those friends and classmates who shared the same birthyear with me weren’t able to make it this far. Why them? Why not me?

I celebrate this birthday with thankfulness because I knew it could have been the other way, but for some reason, the man upstairs saw fit to keep me around. The 25th year allowed to experience things I never thought I would. Growth. Maturity. Struggle.

What I learn from looking through that yearbook is to not take life for granted, because one day, someone will look at a picture of my smiling face and I will no longer be here. What will they say? How will they feel. I can only hope that as I enter my 26th year, I continue to live my life in such a way that people will see something positive in me and I can be a light to someone else.

I don’t know what year 26 holds, but I ready for it and hope it’s ready for me.