I’m sitting at my new desk overlooking a former trap house/ chop shop. To my right is a dirty mirror left by the previous tenant and an orange sun star I bought at the store the other day. The info ticket said the flower can grow up to a foot long. The tiny little fronds frosted with bright yellow pollen might be making me sneeze a little extra, but the color is worth it.

I’ve had two mornings in a row where I’ve slept in. Curled up under the twenty pound weight of the gray weighted blanket that doubles as a dream innoculater. It’s been ages since I’ve had two days in a row where I didn’t have to immediately be somewhere in the morning.

I’ve tossed on my green leather banded pearl bracelet I received from the Kuta JHS staff. I remember standing before the assembled members like some departing son. It’ll serve as the high watermark for my Japanese ability as I described the past two years and how they’d come to shape me. I don’t know that I’ve ever given a speech with that much emotion in my life, let alone in a different language than English.

Yesterday I assembled my rotating bookshelf— I’m slowly putting together a white, wood, paired design eclectic sort of room that I’ve always wanted but have never had before. I feel like if you stepped inside this room you’d have a good handle of what sort of person I am. I don’t know if I can say I’ve had that before. Staggering it’s taken until thirty years old to get that sorted, but each at their own pace.

Sitting with my books to my back and an open window before me— I look forward to this coming summer. One in which distant stars seem quickly approaching.