Complacent

When I was younger, life was so raw and immediate. I wore my passion like a badge of honor and took on injustice as if I was tilting at personal windmills. There was no cause for which I did not have an argument. I was quick to laughter and even quicker to tears.

With age has come a sense of complacency. I am slower to act now, and it takes longer for outrage to build to a fire inside me. And I have lost the great empathy I once had for others' pain.

But in not feeling the world's misery, my heart is somehow lighter. I can enjoy a gorgeous meal, a beautiful film, a delicious sunlit afternoon, without worrying that it is all surface gloss. Maybe, I think, life can be beautiful after all.

I don't know which version of myself is the truth. I worry that my current self - absent her once-driving convictions - is shallow in comparison. But I know she is happier.