on July 28, 1994 a girl was born at 9:08pm at UIC Hospital. Today, she writes a letter to year 27.

Dear 27,

I thank God for bringing me to this point. Lord knows with the odds that have been stacked against me in life, I questioned if I would ever make it this far. 27 trips around the sun is a blessing that I am grateful for. 27 years of figuring out who I am, what my purpose in life is, and what I want out of life. 27 years, and I am so far from done, I’m actually just getting started. 27 years of lessons, blessings, life altering events, and it has all lead me to this point. 27, you will be my greatest year yet. I prayed for you, I worked for you, I changed all of me to be better for you. This year, I promise myself peace, grace, growth, wealth, and all the fruits of my labor thus far. This year, I will pray harder than I ever have, I will have faith beyond what I can see, I will not be naïve to the ways of this world. I will be wise, I will be clothed in dignity, I will mature further, and I will walk in my full purpose and potential. It was a mental, emotional and spiritual battlefield leading up to this point. The years leading to 27 brought me pain and joy in waves. Losing my father and my granny, starting graduate school, finally deciding to quit my first job in my career and go for a larger role, realizing it was time to leave Bloomington and come back home to Chicago and accepting the fact that what I had been asking God for in certain areas, is not what he had planned for me. 27, I am so excited for you. I have grown through all I have endured up to this point. I ended year 26 with a new job, new apartment, starting grad school and finishing my first year with a 4.0, welcoming new people in my life, facing my fears of letting someone treat me how I deserve, without being skeptical of their intentions and most of all I ended year 26 with peace, healing and new perspective. 27, I pray you bring me all that God wants me to have. 27, I prayed for you. Here I was, a little girl, born and raised in Englewood, always told that I was never good enough for college, and that I would end up a product of my environment. I had so many people telling me that I would never amount to the goals I had set for myself. Here I am 27 years old, healthy and blessed. I have a Bachelor of Science degree in Sociology and currently working on a Masters of Educational Leadership with a concentration in Higher Education. I am the Program Coordinator for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion of a private institution. I pray hard, I work hard, I walk by faith and not sight. I am grateful the negative plans of others did not fall upon me. 27 you will be a blessed year, God told me so. When God says yes, nobody can so no.

This year I chose me. If it doesn’t help me grow, it’s got to go.

Cheers to 27 years of being blessed, educated, fine and a force to be reckoned with. God thank you for feeling that the world was missing something and allowing me to be born on July 28th. I am forever grateful.