end of a journal

I finished my most recent journal this week. It always feels like such a significant milestone when I fill up a whole journal. I've titled them all "The Great Adventure" (that started when I was probably sixteen, as you can tell), and this one was "The Great Adventure, Volume VIII." While each journal feels significant, this one took much longer for me to complete than most of mine have - five and a half years. So it felt all the more sentimental and awe-inspiring as I penned the final page. 

My basement suite in BC

Five and a half years ago, I started the journal in my beloved basement suite in BC, in a Covid quarantine, having just returned from Christmas Break to Canada in January 2021. My whole first entry is talking about the man I just started officially dating two weeks before, and with whom I was already have dreams of marriage. And in the months and years that followed I: finished and defended my thesis, graduated with a Master's, moved back to Oregon, dated for a year, got engaged and married,

had a baby, started homeschooling, and bought a new home all together. I started the journal alone in my basement suite, alone but happy and excited. I finished my journal on a bench in our front yard, watching all three kids play together in the cul-de-sac. 

I realized that were I to have written in my first entry what my dream-come-true would have been for five and a half years later, I think this would have been it. 

As I finished the journal and headed back inside, Lucy asked me what my last line was. 

I couldn't read it out loud without crying, so I just let her read it. 

"Could I be more grateful? I don't think it's possible."