Author: abigailblessing

  • The Dangers of Anti-Aging Narratives

    The Dangers of Anti-Aging Narratives

    A month ago, I presented my speech, “Keeping Up Appearances: The Dangers of Anti-Aging Narratives,” in front of my school. I had spent all semester writing, researching, and thinking about this topic, and my presentation was a culmination of my efforts and thoughts. Learning about and speaking on this subject was a transformative experience —…

  • Eighteen Going on Eighty

    Eighteen Going on Eighty

    I turned eighteen several days ago. Considering I have been mentally eighty for several years, physically turning eighteen feels… almost natural. Eighteen is a strange number. Legally, it carries the weight of adult jail, child adoption, marriage, voting, and endless terms & conditions. But eighteen is also an expecting number, waiting for me to act…

  • Quiet Redemption: An Advent Meditation

    Quiet Redemption: An Advent Meditation

    There is a silence that falls on these Christmastide mornings, when the soft morning light filters through the windows and the wind dances through the trees. A silence that beckons to me, stills me. Not only a digital silence but a soul silence as well. My soul sits, watching, waiting, listening. In Watch For the Light, Loretta…

  • A Digital Disconnect

    A Digital Disconnect

    Dear Friends, Please forgive my extended absence. I am plowing through a busy season of college applications that have stolen my time and motivation to blog. I appreciate your grace, dear reader, in opening this letter, even when the writer is weary and fickle. This week, I felt the beckoning of inspiration to write and I followed. …

  • On Playfulness

    On Playfulness

    We seem to have forgotten how to be children. How to approach life with a sense of play. I do not mean recklessness but wonder. To look, actually look, at the world around us. And, as my toddler cousin has shown me, find gaps in the manholes and faces in the puddles.  I was reminded of…

  • How I Am Secretly An Elderly Woman

    How I Am Secretly An Elderly Woman

    Recently, I learned a new piece of vocabulary: “octogenarian.” According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, it refers to “a person whose age is in the eighties.” The word encapsulates how I often feel internally. Although, physically, I am a young lady, I have always been an old soul at heart. Some may find this idea odd…