Isn’t it weird how songs can transport you to completely different places? Whenever "Forever" by Chris Brown comes on I’m taken back to my sixth grade talent and reminded of my sixth grade crush. The opening chords of Van Morrison’s "Brown Eyed Girl" put me back in a wooden Adirondack Chair around the campfire at Camp NYODA on a balmy summer night. Listening to Fall Out Boy’s "The Kids Aren’t Alright" brings me back to the beginning of this year, my freshman year of college, which is shortly coming to a close.

How strange it is to think of how far I’ve come from the places where these songs take me to. Nine months ago, when I first moved into this glorified closet of a room, I was a different person than I am now. We don’t realize how much everything has changed until we’re suddenly forced back to a different time and place. When "The Kids Aren’t Alright" came on my Spotify this morning I was caught by surprise. I hadn’t listened to the song in so long and hadn’t even realized that the me who loved that song is not the me I am right now (whose current musical obsession is Sam Cooke and Ray Charles). Who knew I could change that much in such a short amount of time?

At the beginning of this school year I’m not sure what my predictions, expectations, or desires really were. Generally, I wanted to be a better student, to be smarter, and to succeed, whatever that means. Have I done that? I don’t know. I’ve learned a hell of a lot, that’s for sure. Sure, I learned about evolution and epics of ancient cultures, and the conditional perfect tense in Spanish, and the origins of African-American spirituals, and Walt Whitman’s civil war poetry, but I expected all of that. In one way or another I knew I would be doing a lot of work, reading a lot of books, writing a lot of papers, and learning a lot of things that I wouldn’t have ever expected to be taught in a classroom.

What I didn’t expect was to learn so much about myself and to learn it without even knowing it. What did I learn? Well I learned things like I can write a 10-page research paper in one weekend (although I do not recommend it). I learned that I can navigate around a city all by myself. I learned that I need my space and my time alone. I learned how rejuvenated I feel after a yoga practice or a walk in the woods. I learned that my Myers Briggs personality type is INFJ.

Most importantly I learned that I know myself much better than I’ve ever cared to acknowledge or listen to. Relatively recently I’ve also learned to listen to myself more than ever and that’s how I found myself right here right now. I do what I want, go where I want, read what I like and hangout with people who accept and support me in everything I do. I’ve accepted the fact that I love music and that I don’t have to hide that love because it might not be a lucrative path. I’ve dived head first into my fascination with words and cast off (mostly) my insecurity around my personal work. I’ve realized that I don’t have to decide right now if I want to be a high school teacher or a musician or a professor or a professional vagabond.

So, thank you, Hindsight, for allowing me to fully realize all the things I’ve been learning and accumulating over the last few months. Thank you, Music, for taking me back to places I’ve been so I can realize how far I’ve come. And thank you, Words, for allowing me to make my thoughts into things and my dreams into realizations.