Here in the place I was born,

here for the first time here as I should always have been.

I am alive, stepping forward into the endless wind.

Resistance, pushing against obstacles placed in my path

an innate way of knowing that I’m moving forward.

An internal compass telling me which direction I must go.

This feels like a place to begin anew, and yet also a place to say goodbye. This city along the endless lake burgeons with towering edifices to wealth and engineering alongside factories of centuries ago. A rare place where the past isn’t forgotten, but woven into the future with a care and artistry revealing those here don’t forget where they came from even while they keep moving forward. A place of people who were often unwanted where they came from, outcasts, who knew adversity and struggle in the effort to become something more.

This is a fitting place to say goodbye to what was. A place to acknowledge my past, the often terrible and evil past I never asked for, a past I want to forget ever happened and yet simply can’t. This is a place I can weave the most valuable parts of who I was into the person I am, and who I aspire to be. This is a place to put the wind on my cheeks and step forward, into who I have become, into who I will be.