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A spontaneous text conversation among a collective of friends today opened with a question about which Top Nine app one friend decided to use and turned into a discussion over how the algorithm skews what might truly be the top nine through the favoring of reels or whatever else the platform is focused on promoting that year.
One friend joked about creating her own funny or poignant top nine moments post, based on what she selected, not the algorithm, and the idea resonated with me.
Scrolling back in my own Instagram feed to see if I could find the name of the original app I’ve used in the past, it surprised me to see that I hadn’t done a top nine post since 2019.
It didn’t feel like it’s been 3 years.
It didn’t feel like it’s been 3 years has been my response to many conversations this week. I’ve been promoting my first in person, brick-and-mortar, on location, workshop and it didn’t feel like 3 years had passed since the last time I taught on location.
It didn’t feel like 3 years had passed since my middle grandchild was born. It didn’t feel like 3 years had passed since I moved into my current home. It didn’t feel like 3 years had passed since my divorce proceedings began. It didn’t feel like 3 years had passed since I last actively used my big studio (now closed). It didn’t feel like 3 years had passed since the start of the Pandemic.
Three years of Pandemic life. That’s what hit me.
Three years all rolling into one yeasty body of metamorphosis crusty old shell removing mix. One moment rolling indiscernably into the next.
A seismic sea wave of moments.
Soft-body moments of babies born, art making, friendship bonding, life-changing shifts bouncing into hard-body moments of diagnoses, divorces, deaths, transitions-we-weren’t-ready-for moments being thrust upon us, moment upon moment upon moment upon moment.
Three years have passed. Moment by aching, breathtaking, heartbreaking, I-just-need-a-moment moments.
How do we boil down a life to the top nine moments? Of course I’m no longer talking about Instagram posts. Or am I?
How do we decide what we share and what to hold back about this year of life, these three years of life, the entirety of a life?
How do we decide what moments really matter when we are in the middle of living them?
The human experience encompasses it all. The beauty and the pain. It is both a solitary walk and a communal experience.
Life death living dying breaking mending laughing crying ordinary and extraordinary.
It is everything, all of it, all at once.
It all mattered.
Saying Happy New Year after writing a post like this may seem a little trite or disingenuous maybe? I don’t know, but I mean it.
Whatever moment you happen to be in, whatever your story, wherever you are on your journey in life. I hope that you know it matters because you’re in it. It matters and so do you.
Happy New Year everyone.
To you as well, Crystal. Beautiful reflections.
Thank you Judith 🙏