when i am twenty-three

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? - Mary OliverI end my work day fifteen minutes early so that I can go for a run in the woods. I'm so angry I think I can't quite see straight - angry at myself first, because I fell for a story that wasn't coming true, angry at how when I preached him as a wild gift to my closest friend in the car one afternoon at a red light, God was whispering the truth and I didn't believe it. But my feet move my heart. The prayer, anger to desperate to confused, finally makes it way to the still waters. "God," I pace before, palms opened skyward, "I promised You that this life was Yours. Here. So take it back from me, this life for You, take it back into the mystery of Your will.Tell me - --It is the first time any reader I didn't know from my college days ever emailed me a question for dear hilary. I am sitting on my bed thinking about how I need to probably try to write something again, because it has been weeks and didn't I say I would be better, and not get so discouraged, and not let the poems fall through my fingers because of my fear? They tap out the email with a gentleness, a trust, and in the blackened night blanketed with stars I hear a glimmer that maybe I shouldn't forsake writing - maybe I should just wait.What is it --She and I find five hours on her couch with tea not enough time, because the things that pass between us are so widely varied, journeying among us, our stories keeping us company as afternoons fade to evening, as I look at her in surprise, again and again, because her wisdom is gentler than most. We talked once about the space in conflict, how mediators must create the conversation's parameters but not participate, and we wonder together about what kind of heart you must have to do such work, and I tell her then, that a part of me is so hungry to do just that, but how could I begin? How could I be a builder of spaces and homes for conversations? She smiles, shakes her head, reaches for her teacup. "But of course you already do this."you plan to do --And somewhere, in April, in a bar where I stole a reserved seat at the bar from a couple who apparently decided to wait, or at least, I hope that's what they did, over the rim of my martini glass, I told her in hushed laughter and surprise that this man, I was falling for him, had been for a lot longer than I had admitted, and now what was I to do, feeling the way I did, him so far away and me here, drinking this, in this bar? And she laughed bright in the crowded space, her hand briefly closing over mine. "You tell the truth." We laughed and laughed that night, about the way that I brought Lizzy Bennet to life, about how love is always out ahead of us, beckoning us forward. In the car that night on my way home, I whispered, "I see a little better who you might want me to be, I think." And God said, "Hilary, you are Mine."with your one --There aren't words enough for the way this year has unfolded. Perhaps there will never be, and I cling to the older, better question because it is a kind of promise, on its own, that I don't ever stop asking or need to stop asking about this life, all tangled by belonging and wandering and returning. And I cannot stop wondering, not now a year later, about what we inherit from our former selves and what we give them in return, about how we love, and where, and untamed spaces we go running into all for the sake of love.wild and precious life? --Oh, it is a wild and precious life, Mary Oliver, and I'm grateful alongside you.Love,hilary

dear hilary: your twenty two year old self

Dear Hilary,You turn 22 today. Happy birthday, sweet pea. It's an exciting moment in your story. Another year, another step in the midst of your real, wild, precious life. This time last year you wrote a letter to yourself to try and teach yourself lessons for the future. You wanted to learn how to be patient, how to laugh, how to remember the moon rising over the Atlantic or the feeling of your muscles carrying you home.And here we are, a year later. How we grow is not best measured in years. It's a tangled, unlikely journey. You've grown much more and much less than you think. You won't really know what the last year was until you're telling someone years from now, when "Stubborn Love" by The Lumineers plays on the radio and you smile.But the very first Dear Sugar column you read (funny, isn't it? That wasn't very long ago) was from a 22 year old. It was called "Tiny Beautiful Things" and it changed your life. And now a book by the same name is on its way to you. Dear Sugar's letter was asking for advice. What would you tell yourself at 22? It seemed like the right moment, now, to write that letter.Give more than you have. When someone asks you to take a walk with them and they hold their heart out, trembling and raw, to you, take it gently. Sometimes you must give it back to them. Sometimes you must hold it in your hands and not let go. Not even when you don't know what to do and you are screaming in your head that you are only 22 and you don't know anything! Not knowing and still holding on is the gift.You are not your college transcript. You are not the silver bowls gathering dust next to your brother's Star Wars battleships - not the awards, not the opportunities, not even the ones you are most proud of. Laugh, Hilary. How could those things be the sum of who you are? You are alive and growing. There aren't boxes or categories to contain you. If your heart feels left behind, remember that love is never wasted, only given a new purpose. Remember that disappointed hopes are still beautiful. Remember that most of the work you were meant to do was in the hoping, not the coming true. Don't work too much. There is enough time. Not everything you touch is urgent.You are most wise when you admit you have no earthly idea what the hell you're going to do. You are closest to the truth when you lie in your bed sweating on a July night and whisper to Jesus that He'll have to fix it, because you can't.You aren't really very old, sweetheart. So dance to "Hello" and for goodness' sake, will you please stop worrying about how you look? It's the time you forgot your makeup and didn't care that you were the most radiant. It's the joy you have in your body and your heart that's beautiful.Call even if they don't call you back. Write letters. Do not waste your time on less than real love. Sugar's right: it moves freely in both directions. Set yourself free from trying to earn it. Give it to others as much as you possibly can, and then more.Be brave enough to be empty. Be braver than you think you need to be. And yes, you'll keep learning this over and over. Desire and heartache and confusion and courage can't be mastered in a day. Or a year. You will relearn everything a hundred times.It's a gorgeous world and a broken one. But it is your one wild life, love. Spend your heart in it. Love,hilary