You haven’t seen me in a while.

I’ve had this feeling of ageing a lot more lately. I’m aware how silly that can sound - I’m twenty-two, I’m far from done - but I have a lot of reasons, however superficial, to feel like I’m growing up. For the last two years (or thereabouts), I’ve been navigating a relationship that has taken me to places (literal and metaphorical) that I never thought I’d experience. There are less emotional processes, too, that have begun to shape me - I’ve started my first salaried job, which brings with it this odd level of stability and permanence (even though it’s a fixed contract and part time). It’s been a few years since I’ve undergone any major upheaval, and I have a lot coming at me at once.

I looked at a few old photos and videos the other day, too. Of course there are the really old ones, like the one on the left up there. I’m fifteen there. I have spots, and by that, I mean a few - if you zoom in (and I recommend that you don’t), I’m in the midst of an acne bout that’s only really dulled by the fact that the photo was taken in Scotland during the winter. And the hair. (I wore really bad shirts, too, but that’s another story.)

But I can’t wrap my head around the difference in my face. It’s hard to get past, initially - you identify with your own reflection the most, and always underestimate your own age - but seven years is starting to look like it should. It’s not just understanding when a haircut’s overdue; my cheekbones are more pronounced than my cheeks now, I have a jawline that feels a lot more pronounced, and at such a stupidly young age I already have crow’s feet.

That other one was taken shortly after I started university. It’s a bit more recognisable, but it still looks a lot softer. Less weathered. The Chris in the photo on the left is about to go through a lot of secondary trauma, trying (and failing) to navigate the crippling mental illness of others at a painfully young and inexperienced age. He’s also yet to understand what really being in love is like. The Chris on the right has come out of that, and is starting to make sense of it all, but he has his own anxieties and depression to come. But he has the space to flourish again - to engage in a load of projects, to forge new friendships and relationships. He’s fresh off the back of a trip to Florida to meet someone he’d only ever spoken to online, and by this point has spent a fortnight with no friends or family in the centre of Marrakech.

The Chris at the top still has mental issues, but they’re softer, background annoyances rather than day-to-day nightmares. He’s getting married in a few months. He’s fallen in love again - something the Chris on the right would probably scoff at. The next couple of years are probably going to change his face a little more. There’ll be peaks - and if trends are anything to go by, a steady increase in them - and troughs, and more experience to integrate. Something else to add to the autobiography.

Maybe in three years’ time I’ll have stopped thinking about myself so much.