Pants Vs. our old friend fear and you and me

I often start these posts, and stop before ever coming near hitting publish.
I used to write so carefully, these moments of humor and sorrow and worrisome weeks, but it's all but left me in the last few months.
I can't tell if I'm just bored of writing, or if I've lost my mojo, or if I've just plain run out of time to sit and think up creative ways to tell my stories.
or maybe I'm just lazy.

a lot of time has been spent, in and outside of my head, thinking about how in a few weeks time I'll be turning 30. and on any given day that notion terrifies me.
I keep asking people in my life, how did you feel. what changed. will this feeling of lack of accomplishments fade away and I'll magically somehow be able to get over myself and appreciate the things I DO have, instead of mourning those things I do not posses?
the answer I most often get is that, just like any other birthday, it feels like nothings changed. but as the days tick on by a certain air of confidence creeps in, and eventually it's evened out and you're just 30. just like you were just 29, 28, 17, 5.
I was told today too, from a woman I can admire, that her 30's were spent mostly building her life. her 20's, she said, were a write off.

I can't speak much for my 20's anymore. I find myself looking back at them with great joy and great pride, but also so much great sorrow.
I tell people, when they ask me now, why did you move back to alberta, why did you write off so many of your friends, why did you quit your career and instead take on working part time in a pet store when it hardly pays the bills. why did you spend the last year breaking so many things?
I tell them, truth is..I don't have the answers. I don't have any sort of justification that I could spell out on here, or in the air, to explain my reasoning.
no matter if I'm 29, or 30, or 85, I'm searching. I'm looking for something that I haven't found yet.
I didn't find it in ontario, I didn't find it when I moved back to alberta. I didn't find it in the people I no longer speak to. I didn't find it at work, and I haven't found it fully in anything. yet.
but I have found pieces of it where I am right now.
I survive. I always have. I do well and good enough with the choices I've made. I value things like sunday evenings, spent drinking tea on the couch with my dear friends who I credit with my life on a daily basis. everyone now, so careful to love me unconditionally, we gel in a perfect way that I love. I couldn't imagine life without these moments.
and this year, this 29 as I've stated many times, has been the worst year of my life - from start to finish.
as it comes to a close I look back and mourn the loss of the people I love. mourn them daily like you would mourn anything that's passed away. I miss the carefree moments when I felt like I was truly able to be myself, and I mourn the laughter and the love and the good things that I force myself to remember, instead of all the bad.
as it comes to a close, I look back and think that my choices, albeit reflected against everyone Else's - to be strange and counter productive, have shaped me into a more accepting and gracious human being.
as it comes to a close I wish that I did have answers to those questions that would be sufficient. but I still don't. and I don't think I ever will. and I'm ok with that. because despite it being the worst year of my life, it's also been the best.

I was compared to Hunter S Thompson today. an honor I don't feel anywhere near deserving of, but I love the person who said it so much that I'll take it that badge and wear it proudly. because she's the reason I'm writing again today. and I can't be humble or appreciative enough to that fact.
so I'll end this now with a quote from him that I've always loved from fear and loathing.

"Maybe it meant something. Maybe not, in the long run. but no explanation, no mix of words or music or memories can touch that sense of knowing that you were there and alive in that corner of time and the world. Whatever it meant."