3 days ago I turned 27.

Such a strange number. I don't feel like I own the number 27 yet. It reeks of adulthood, responsibility, of arriving at sobering wisdom after the brashness of the teens. Sure, I have mellowed. Slowed down and looked over my shoulder with a little wistful smile and chuckle at unbridled recklessness of the past. No regrets, grateful for all the wild things and what they have taught me.

It is the things that I have not experienced, that I regret.

Counting the ticks on my bucket list, my gathering of experiences, my measure of life. I frown on the empty check boxes, the clean swathes of landscapes unexplored. I need to break new ground. The monotony is getting too familiar, too comfortable.

I am 27 and I am 3 years away from 30. I do not feel like an adult yet. And time would not wait for me, or be there for me. People ask what's the rush, I tell them I don't know when the end will come. So I seek.

Then there are days I seek Other Things. Because life happens in the waiting for future things.  These respites don't last too long before I'm once again hit by the pull. And that inevitable desire to wait, look forward towards a potential future starts to grip me by the throat again. It gets difficult to live in the moment when this happens.

Still. Still, I must try. Life is this moment now, this second. And the present is all I will ever have.

This castle, I will build one day. Meanwhile I have got books. And thanks to give for all that I have so far.

Four functioning limbs, functioning body, mind and spirit. Check, check, check. That is good enough for today.