Dear Kaitlyn, 

You turn 27 today. Your Saturn Return is upon us. It is your “astrological coming of age.” **Earlier this month, you explained to us how it’s supposed to mean hardship and growth; that it is the end of your childhood era.

At the time, I jokingly responded in all caps, “why does every astrological thing mean hardship and growth?”

But today is your birthday and you’re 27 and it’s a big deal to me (because you’re a big deal to me) and I need you to know what I wish I would’ve replied to you instead:

You know I don’t think we ever get good at hardship, no matter how much we face or for how long. Practice just never makes perfect. But I have watched you persevere like riding a bike as though you never forget how to do it. You are one of the only people I have ever met completely fluent in hope.

Do you know you’re the reason I believe in magic?
How I am left speechless every time you transform uncertainty into courage, how to this day I still do not know how you turned loneliness into so much love. Do you realize how extraordinary you have to be to create gentleness out of suffering?

As for growth, I don’t think it ever gets easier either. Ironically, it never outgrew playing dress up, always masquerading as emptiness and loss. But I have watched you give up a town small enough to hold your hand for a city big enough to applaud every one of your dreams. And you did it without hesitation.

Do you know you’re the reason I believe in manifestation?
How the sun shines brighter with you and winter nights aren’t as cold and how you have convinced me without even trying that the world is big and worth seeing and meaningful. Do you realize you make people feel that way as well, like they are big and worth seeing and meaningful? 

You know, I used to think endings were never not sad. That both childhood and its conclusion were more bitter than sweet. But over the last six years, I have watched you greet every new version of myself like an old friend, as if to promise me there is no previous version worth grieving over. You have taught me how to be kind to myself just by association.

Do you know you’re the reason I believe in soulmates?
How you have changed my life just by wanting to be in it, how you honestly saved it just by waiting for me when I got a little lost, how you made sure I had something to come back to when I finally found my way again. Do you realize you’re the reason I take more photos now, that you not only make me want to capture memories but live long enough to look back on them?

Kaitlyn, you turn 27 today and your Saturn Return is upon us. You explained when it’s over you’re supposed to be a different person altogether and you told us you’d see us on the other side. And you’re right. I’ll be there. In fact, we’ll all be there. We wouldn’t miss it for the world. You will be embraced with open arms and flooded with secondhand joy the moment you finally make it. 

I’ll look around and then look at you and exclaim, “It’s beautiful here, the other side.”

But I hope you know, in the meantime, we’re still not going anywhere. 
We will be with you the entire way.
*We will meet you wherever you are. 

Happy Birthday, Kaitlyn.
It’s beautiful here, this life with you.

Love you from one Saturn Return to another a million times forever,
Grace 

**Texts from Kaitlyn inspiring this poem. Thank you for being someone who inspires me to write. It is the best of me, because of you.