At the age of 28, I lost my mother to lung cancer.

At the age of 29, I had my first big business – a rock bar, where I poured all of my inheritance. It was going to be the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back; because at the age of 30, my six-year marriage ended.

I found myself a single mother at the age of 31 and moved back to the island that I called home when I was 23. I chose to teach over a project manager position at one of the biggest publishing houses in the country. Several months later, I met the man destined for me.

At the age of 32, I had a tremendously successful local travel agency and boutique.

By the time I was 33, I was traveling the world with my daughter, while I and my then-boyfriend had a beach resort and a beach bar back in my home country.

I moved to Italy at the age of 34, married the love of my life, and subsequently, retired. The succeeding six years were spent healing and growing. With unbelievable courage, my husband and his family helped me grow stronger, both in mind and in the body. With this strength, I found my own courage to face the demons of my past and attend to every little unfinished business I had.

And now I am 40, emerging out of retirement, and I am ready to live my best life yet. We have purchased a home of our own, with a garden to grow my flowers and vegetables, and a view of the sunset and the sea. My husband has gifted me with the first-ever car I have ever owned. In a few months, my home office will be finished, and I am looking forward to writing my books. I have businesses ready for take-off, any time I am ready. There is nothing else I can wish for.

I was never nobody. I have been many things in the past that sometimes it seems I have lived so many lives. There are many stories about me. Some of them false, some of them exaggerated, some of them told in a way to make me look worse than I actually was, some of them true to the letter, but you will never really know unless you hear it from me. It’s time to tell the world my story, from my own lips, from the deepest recesses of my mind.

I make it a point to celebrate with grandeur every turning of a decade of my life. Not to show off, but because, as a person living with bipolar and borderline personality disorder, I can never tell if I’m going to make it to the next year. I tell my husband that there must be a reason why I keep waking up every after each attempt to end my life, and I am determined to find it. I am also determined to touch and change people’s lives as much as I can because maybe, that’s also the reason why I am still here.

Who knows what is my or anyone else’s purpose in life? Maybe there is none and maybe it’s better to just find interesting things to do until we die. Whatever the reason for our living, there are some things that I am sure of. And it’s that we should take nothing but pictures, leave nothing but footprints, and kill nothing but time.

I, thank you.

Categories: 2022 Musings

Tagged as: 2022 birthday post musings

Angku

Crazy wife. Mother of two.