1 Year Post Grad

This week the Graduating Class of 2019 will be having their commencement at my Alma Matter, San Diego State University. It was just a year ago, that I walked the stage and received my Bachelors of Arts in Psychology and Africana Studies, with a minor in Counseling and Social Change. ( A mouthful huh?) I thought there no better time than the present, to reflect on the year I have had since my graduation. Let me say this first, it was nothing like how I imagined it would be. I have experienced more joy and pain in the last year than I thought I could handle. I have fought battles that I thought were farther off and I have felt so lost along the way, that I just wanted the easiest and quickest way out.

My friends warned me of the post grad life, the emptiness that comes along with not having class schedules anymore. No forgotten deadlines and last minute assignments due at 11:59pm while your at a concert (yes this has happened a few times). Just cold hard adulting! After graduation I had one of the best summers. I went on a cruise to Mexico, my scattered group of friends came to town for my 23rd birthday, and I started a new relationship (something I never saw coming). During this time, I was sure that by August I would be moving back to Sacramento and I dreaded the thought. Part of me felt, that if I returned home at this time, I would be a failure. Yes I graduated college, but I had a plan. What about the graduate school program at SDSU that I wanted to be in so bad, that I had just got denied for. Or about my vision to focus on the black community and mental health, a passion I developed during my college career. How could I go back, when everything I "needed" to start my life was right here. I talked to God and then things began to fall into place, like magic.

I found an apartment to rent with my best friend, whose post grad plans also failed. I found the job I wanted and even had a little boyfriend. I was doing it, I was adulting I was grown. Then in September as I'm riding this freedom wave, my mother calls to tell me my aunt is sick. Pause, let me give you a short backstory.

My mom has 2 sisters and 2 brothers. My father was absent my entire childhood (Black American Dad Story), but my mother was never alone she had my aunts and my grandmother, extra mommies! Each of these women has had a major in hand in the woman I have become and will grow into. I see parts of them in me all the time and it drives me crazy and I love it. My grandmother passed away from Cancer when I was 9, but my aunts stepped up and made sure that I was never late to school, a practice (dance, volleyball, basketball, soccer, piano whatever my mom could put me in) and they all made sure I knew the Lord.

Resume: My Auntie Elaine is one of the most intelligent women I know. Her love for education and children was something she was known for. But also her serious activity level. The woman was 65, but could still give you a little run on the court. How sick could she be? Apparently so sick that when she went in, she never came out. For 3 months I flew back and forth home to check on my aunt and family. To be there to support and get support. It was at this moment I wish I would have heeded her words, "Taylor girl, just come back to Sacramento". But no, "I knew" where I was supposed to be right.

November 29th was a rainy gloomy day in San Diego and my spirit had been off all morning. I went to work (at the time I did in home support with children who had autism). I was having fun helping my little girl read and do some writing, and I couldn't help but think about my aunt. Not 5 minutes later, from the corner of my eye I saw my phone flashing, It was my mom (girl you know I'm at work) so I declined. She called again and I missed it and then my cousin called and I knew it was serious. They told me she was leaving, and I to hurry up and say goodbye. The next morning I cried the whole plane ride home (thank the Lord its only an hour and a half flight.) One of my warriors was gone, my second mother. And when I stepped into her house (the house I was raised in) my pictures still hung from walls, my toys still in the room, my baby dresses still in the drawer. My aunt never had children, but she took care of me as her own, especially when my mother was in the hospital.

Only 6 months after I graduated, did I have to say goodbye to the person my education mattered most to. I was angry, I was sad, I was lonely (broke up with new relationship before the new year) and most of all I was 495 miles away from the people I NEEDED most. It was at this time, stuck in a lease, barely talking to the best friend I moved in with, working a job I hated, I knew that I should be home.

While in my aunts house I found a note tucked away in a book. It was a plan for a Community Program for little black girls focused on education and wellness. The crazy thing is, I had my own notebook filled with my own plans that looked a lot like hers. Are you serious right now? The moment I needed to talk to her most...if i had just moved back like she asked.

But I didn't. I didn't move back, I didn't get into the grad program, I didn't find love. What did I do huh? I stayed here a year for what. I spent months being angry with myself about the failures and pains of the last year. But today I realize that I stayed to grow, to feel, to get closer to myself. How can I ask for someone to love me, when I truly did not know how to love myself. How could I have focused in grad school with all of this family trauma happening? Those closed doors weren't for me and I know that now.

So, 1 year post grad, what have I learned?

1) I do not know everything and I never will

2) I am exactly where I need to be

3) My life is divinely guided, I just have to listen hard for the intuition and wisdom.

4) Giving into the fear of failure will always result in failure

5) My mother was right: "All who wander are not lost"

I'm not lost, I am the Black Girl in Wander.

Welcome.