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Over the edge.

I met my old Spanish teacher yesterday morning for breakfast with a couple of friends. I was late. It was very strange. Sometimes I forget that I'm not a child anymore. I'm a legal adult. I'm not restricted to only being a student. I can be a friend, too.

We all traded stories and caught up over bagels and coffee. It was nice. It had been years since I had seen Profa. Four years? Five years? Too long, I think. We made plans to all meet up again in a couple of weeks. That should be fun. I was glad to hear that she was doing fine at her new school, settled back in with her family. She deserves to be happy.

We all said our farewells and went our separate ways after a couple of hours. It's nice to know you have friends out there. It's a big world.

And the year is almost over. It's been a long year. The world has changed. Everyone has changed. I've changed. Except, I do not think that people change. Faults do not magically disappear and good qualities do not randomly emerge. It's all latent. It's all part of the same person who, while maturing, discovers new personality aspects that were always there. And will always be there.

That is okay.

I've learned a lot this year. About myself and the people I hold close. And the people I haven't quite met yet. Surprisingly, if you give people a chance, it turns out they are not so terrible. As long as you give the right people a chance. The right people get harder find.

That is okay, too.

Every year we get a little smarter, which is not to be confused with getting wiser. And there is a difference. As we get smarter we create new things: flashier, more expensive, and less useful. We build more terrible things and create new ways to have a terrible life. We find ways to slow ourselves down with the supposed intent of moving forward. Some people are pretentious enough to call this 'progress.' But I digress. It's been a long year of failures, disappointments, and mistakes. And here we stand, on the threshold of a new era of failures, disappointments, and mistakes. It's going to be a terrible year.

That is probably okay.

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