37

("you asked for a challenge, a voice inside you repeats")

Life is so fucking short, and heavy and sad so much and you've been dealt such a melancholy disposition, but fuck, that makes your highs so beautiful, so out of this world. This year I hope you capitalize on that. I hope when you read this letter you feel hopeful, grateful for the year that passed and even more excited about writing the letter for the year to come.

When my knees buckled, New York held me. I didn't have to leave it, and I think now more than ever that I maybe never will... I realized that the greatest strength is that we have to love: friends, lovers, enemies, ourselves... My heart is still too worn to envision new love, and too scared to ask for another challenge, and still I do. I hope you keep writing. Keep reworking. I hope you stay soft, vulnerable, loving, in whatever way that means.
 
You get better every year, remember that.  
Happy Birthday.