I always wanted to be the girl who ended up with her high school sweetheart. Then I went to college and studied abroad and discovered, quite literally, a whole new world that my ex had no interest in being a part of. But I still wanted to be that girl who ended up with her college sweetheart. I was in love with the idea of being in love forever; of being that couple who could say they had been in love for 50 years. Then I lived in a different country for a whole year and thought, nope. I fell in love with my adopted country. I always believed, grew up believing, was socialized to believe, that the core part of femininity was getting married and having children. Why wouldn’t a woman want to do that? I would always think. Well fuck those thoughts and fuck what I was socialized to believe and fuck how we are raising our females today. Fuck all of that. Women are more than just their childbearing abilities. And the sooner we start raising our children, both female and male, to believe that, the better. That is, if I ever decide to have children. Because first I want to see the world—all of it. I want to walk the Camino de Santiago and see the seven wonders of the world and backpack across South America. I want to do everything I’ve always dreamed of doing, everything I want to do, everything that everyone else who is busy getting married and having children puts off until retirement. I want to LIVE.