Past, Present, Future and the Cusp

Let's start this in the most typical way possible: it was the start of the summer of 2025. I took a redeye flight into Baltimore, Maryland where I landed at 5 in the morning. I stayed with my friend's parents until it was time to take the drive into Washington D.C. I ultimately, arrived and settled into my dorm, where I would live for the next eight weeks.

It is currently the end of week three, and the tide has taken its turn.

Now, to truly start this post, I present the question:

have you ever found yourself on the cusp?

Stuck in the in-between?

Overwhelmed with what you have endured and overcome with the unknown of what's to come?

Okay, I suppose I started with three questions, but yet I find myself here hanging in the in-between. I have arrived in Washington D.C. and my sphere of life continues to expand. To see the way in which the world turns within this city, it just had me awestruck.

I drew a simple parallel to help my mind grasp the new current existence. It was like the scene in Zootopia when the fox and his business partner set up shop to sell popsicles to the hamsters as they get out of work and they all file out and follow the hamster in front of them in their little suits. Everything moves in a flow here. By 8:30 am you can expect people to start heading to work in their business attire and things get busy around 12:00 pm for lunch and again around 5:00 pm when everyone gets off work.

I will say this city is greener than I expected, I hadn't been previously exposed to the wealth of green within the general east coast. Even though there was a grid of concrete pathways and buildings there were still trees with hanging branches there to provide a sense of sanctuary as you pass.

There was one morning in particular, I was heading back from the gym. No doubt my chin pointed upward in order to admire the pockets of sunlight peeking through the curtains of green leaves. Suddenly a small bird hopped across my path and before I had the ability to curve the ends of my lips in a slight smile, it lifted its tail feathers and produced a trio of worms on the pavement.

The awe-inspiring city life; it never ceases to amaze me.

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Nonetheless, let us return to this bout of being in-between.

Here I find myself in a sense of slow motion this summer. Evidently, after concluding a fast paced spring semester, going from having 8 things on a to-do list to 2 can change the pace of things. But, whilst I went about Washington D.C. joining the school of fish that went to work at 9 am I couldn't help but consider is this really all it means to grow up? Wearing dress pants and a suit jacket, into the office which becomes your place of inhabitance for the greater duration of the day?

When it came time for lunch, my fellow intern and I would take to walking around the city to get some sunlight. But this was the reality, it was the way in which this world turned, this was what it looked like to be successful and have a career. Go into the office and sit at your desk, get some work done, and go home.

Now luckily, I am only an intern so my life includes fun bouts of adventure as well, or it has thus far at least. Within the streets of Washington D.C. on the weekends, pencil skirts and dress pants are replaced with sun dresses and shorts. (Side note: I still make sure to carry an umbrella with me though, as you never know when a storm will decide to roll in.)

My friends and I, while enjoying some cheese and wine on a sophisticated Friday evening, decided the time had come to explore. We sought out for the typical bucket list item and walked over to the monuments...at 11:30 pm.

This evening was one of the first times since I had arrived in D.C. that I could feel the abundance of life really shining through. The same places I had previously seen in the sticky afternoon whilst navigating through crowds of people, suddenly took on a different personality. Without the previous environmental factors, we were able to see the monuments in their vastness and just that, nothing more. The wine may have assisted my newfound adoration, but we had real conversations too, about life and the intensity of the "real world". We felt the weight of the necessity to making a living. Soon we would no longer be able to hold the crutch of college student occupations.

Still the city swoops in as an inspiration towards aspiring towards passion. I've experienced so much life here, attending performances and museums. The beauty that exists here is salient. While I had initially been discouraged by what felt like monotony, the office isn't all there is to success.

I have come in contact with a multitude of individuals and groups that advocate for the things they are passionate about. If there is an issue, you will likely find it being advocated for here. It is evidently also the hotbed for political debates and news but amongst that are passionate people. I found myself interning at a nonprofit organization and I am reminded of the ability to pursue things you are passionate about and actually take effective steps toward change in the individuals I work with. The women I have met exemplify what it means to use passion as the driver for success, which continues to build their platform to create positive and effective change. That might sound like a Disney Channel commercial but it is true. Yet, the truth is much harder to act on rather than write about.

Still I am experiencing that in between thing, I can't quite put my finger on it, but in being here, on my own, away from school, with office personnel replacing friends I saw everyday, I felt as though the reminder that in one year I would be thrust fully into the world was striking me in the face. But still, I have a year left of college.

Here I am on the cusp. Squished between the admiration of what my life has consisted of this past year and the anxiety of what life will be like when I am on my own.

I find myself unable to appreciate the blessing of the present.

That this here is exactly what life is now. While it looks different than what I may be used to, this is it. I had forgotten the importance of accepting things as they were, to be able to just sit and appreciate the things around me rather than fogging my vision with predictions of the future.

So this cusp, is just a transition I suppose. A sort of cross wave situation and I need to be present in all it comes with, though it is a rare sighting, I must navigate nonetheless. I currently exist here, I wake up to this sun in the morning, I have to be present because this is where I am. In fact it becomes simpler here, just. be. present.

"There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens"

- Ecclesiastes 3:1 NIV