i went for a drive today.

around the lake, with the wind teasing my hair, windows down, without a single worry in my head. listening to jon foreman and laughing all the way. it was one of the most beautiful moments in my life.

i remember when i got my first car, going for a drive just for the heck of it. roaming and wandering just for the sake of feeling the leather steering wheel in my hands, the pulsating of the rubber meeting the road with ease, feeling as though the whole entire world was at my fingertips. i could go anywhere i wanted, i could be anyone i wanted to be. maybe at home, i was jessica ann-lynn. but on this road, i could be whatever i pleased...i could be a writer, on her way to a meeting with her publisher. i could be a college student, late for a psych test, i could have been anything...and that's what was so romantic about those late afternoon drives.

and now, here i sit, almost three years later. and the time has flown. i've grown up more than i anticipated, i've felt pain i never wanted to know, and i've experienced opportunities my own overimaginative mind couldn't have dreamed up itself. so i'm leaving the bookstore, wondering to myself what i'm going to do with the next half hour before i decide to imprison myself to a desk and a lot of work that needs to get done. and my heart says "go for a drive."

and who am i to deny my heart the very thing it wants?

i make an unexpected turn, and end up driving 'round the lake...well, as far as i can, it's under construction. and i can't stop smiling, romanticizing my life to the point where i realize that it's ridiculous to be unhappy with who i am or what i have or don't have. maybe i'm alone...maybe i'm single, but i'm so happy. isn't that what life is all about? god never wanted us to hate what we had, he wants us to cherish it. so these thoughts are speeding through my head, and i'm speeding through another red light, and it hits me like a freight train:

i am content.

once again. after months of inner turmoil, after longings so suppressed, after heartache, and pain i never want to know again...i've mellowed out. i'm growing up. and i'm content with it. i love the fact that i'm coming alive in a new way. so maybe i don't listen to loud rock and sing at the top of my lungs with my bubbly persona like i did once upon a time when i was 16. maybe now, i love to listen to an acoustic guitar and one voice just softly serenading me, and maybe the industrial world isn't what i'm looking for like i once was. starbucks seems overrated, hollister and abercrombie and coach and fendi and fossil are all so meaningless, compared to this feeling i've got, with my wind tousled hair and my obvious grin, people may think i'm going insane, and i don't care. because i'm happy with my life. and they just wish they had a wonderful life like mine.