The blog is three years old today.

Three whole years ago Pierson and I took our incessant gchat conversations from private to public for the purpose of…we had no idea. Truly.

I can tell you the goal wasn’t to end up in Los Angeles three years later pursuing a career in entertainment. And while that result certainly isn’t wholly owed to this blog (sorry Mom, the search for a scapegoat continues), it’s not not because of this blog that I’m here. That’s one very specific story. This one, to be exact.

Today’s specific story is about how things have changed here over the past three years. “It’s crazy to read your writing now,” said one friend who’s followed since the very beginning, “There is a legit difference between the you then and the you now. I think you maybe grew up.”

I promise you, that wasn’t the goal either.

Reading back through the titles of the 500+ postings over the past 365×3 days (can’t locate calc function on computer) there is a definite progression.

Here is the very first thing we wrote – a statement of fact and feeling that basically said, “isn’t this stage of life weird? Let’s talk about it.”

That’s what we/I intended to do – keep something in between a cynic/critical and rose-colored glass eye on life at this coming of age stage to expose and evaluate what we think and feel. Too much to slap under a blog title heading, but essentially the gist of what we thought this blog would become.

But in a sort of life-imitating-art relationship, the subject matter became largely about hooking up, dating, and how to get into and out of both as unscathed as possible. It was what we were all talking about, obsessing over and drinking to, so it became the primary focus of my writing. Whole series on how to initiate communication over Facebook, what defines a slut, and dating inside our outside your league, if leagues even exists. We were at entry level jobs making just enough money to live and drink off, and we couldn’t focus on much beyond how we were stacking up against every other 20-something in the rat slash relationship race.

Come 25/26 though – things took a shift. Katie applied to graduate school, which made us all start to think about whether we should apply to grad school too. Carly and Matt readied for a life together, which made us all start to think about how very un-readied we were for that same scenario. Friends became managers and then directors of things. People younger than us had assistants. And, in an ironic twist of order that smacked of an after-school special, we started to know too much about the way things work to be able to continue working them as we were.

That’s when posts like “Some jobs are like hot men”, and “The S.S. Wunderkinds” , and “There’s nothing to fear but Ramen Noodles.”

Things became a little bit less about who we were dating slash trying to date and a little bit more about who are we, and how can we be more like who we want to be.

And by “things” and “we” I mean I personally started to look to future years more than future nights and to say, I want those things over there, how do I get it/them/him?

FF another year and I received the following comment:

“Oh, and I don’t know if you’re aware of this or care, or think it’s a good thing or not, or plan on it just being temporary or not, but since right before you moved, this blog suddenly seems to be a lot more about you (the move, your boyfriend) and a lot less about everyone/thing else. Just to bring that to your attention if it wasn’t already so you can decide if that’s a thing you want or not.”It was the first time in a long time that I’d thought about what this blog is and what I want it to be. Yes, I was and am aware that through my experience transitioning from New York to L.A., exploring a new career, and now exploring a very new relationship – the blog has changed. It isn’t about how to go to a bar alone or how to pick girls up or why we’re still single. I always sourced material from my own life to cover topics about what we were all experiencing, but somewhere around when I decided to come clean about the quarter life crisis I found myself in the midst of, I realized that writing about that specific (job, move, boyfriend) was more powerful for me (and I hoped interesting to you) than writing about the general topics of this quarter life experience.

So – yes – I’ve noticed the change, and yes, I’ve decided it’s a thing I want.

I write for a lot of reasons, but my commitment to this blog was always because I hoped my thinking was somehow connecting with your thinking to make this bizarre time in our lives somehow less terrifying.

What I don’t think I realized until very recently was that this blog is as much about my thinking connecting with my acting and feeling as it is about my thinking connecting to your thinking.

Every time I’ve sat down to write over the past three years, I’ve learned something about myself – sometimes significant, sometimes ridiculous, sometimes related to proper grammar (or my lack thereof), but always something.

This blog has grown up over the past three years because I’ve grown up. It’s transitioned from a blog by a New York City girl living a fast-paced life obsessed with asking questioning and doling out answers to a blog by a Los Angelene with a new life, unexpected boyfriend and very different outlook on the idea of some questions existing unanswered. Some things about it will never change – the cast of characters, the unapologetic tone, the fact that I write out the word slash. But the rest of it always will change and grow as I slash we move from our mid 20’s to our late 20’s to whatever Armageddon awaits in our pre-30’s.

Three years is a blink of an eye, but luckily I have an online catalog of everything I was experiencing as that time flew by, which is an incredible thing…99% of the time.

Not that I’d ever take back the 1%…