roots and rootlessness
am i wasting my 20s?
It drives me crazy how much I’ve moved around in the past few years.
Like many — dare I say, most — people in their early 20s, life has felt rootless. Not tied down to anything solid, timeless, and lasting. Too dynamic, fluid for seeds to take hold in the earth. Too quickly blown along somewhere new.
Throughout university, I’d live somewhere new every four months. Every four months, I’d rotate between school, internships, back to school. Every four months, I’d be living in a different city, doing different work, sleeping in a different bed, surrounded by different people. Friends and family revolved on a carousel. From spending every day together to catching up every other month. Ceaselessly close, then deeply distant.
Each place, I’d carve out the grooves for my days to fall into. Try to curate a realistic routine that incorporates everything I want to do. But as soon as I’d get comfortable, find a familiar rhythm, I’d be packing up my bags, on the move again.
I’ve learned how much of my identity is malleable based on where I am. How I feel. How I go about my day. How much I prioritize certain things—morning routines or long walks or friend time. Places draw different characteristics out of me. I want to make my parents proud, my friends laugh, myself calm.
Since graduating in April, I’ve gone from rootless to weightless. Like I divvied up my life into thirty separate parts.
I rotate between my Mom’s house in the suburbs, my Dad’s condo downtown, cottages, friend’s places, events, travel. In the past four months, I’ve slept in 14 different beds (no, not what you’re thinking). Oh, and one car from 2am to 5am just south of Pittsburg (long story).
I’ve lived mostly out of my backpack. A few sets of clothes, my running shoes, books, a journal, pens, my laptop. Everything I need. Strapped around my shoulders.
There’s a tip-of-the-tongue-type irritance that’s hard to grab hold of, like a splinter under the skin. The picking up, packing up. Putting my life into a backpack. Setting it on the floor somewhere new each week.
A frustration from not having a life that feels more permanent, settled, consistent. A frustration from not having roots.
The idea of planting roots, committing to a life, expanding into it (or just sleeping in the same bed!) feels inviting. Somewhere I can stay for a while. Somewhere I can confidently call home. Somewhere I can unpack my books out of their boxes and put them on a shelf (okay… several shelves). Where my life is all in one place. Where I can look at it, touch it, feel it exist in physical space.
Rootlessness presents both a beautiful promise and a terrifying fear. To not be attached to anything. To not be tethered.
Maybe it’s just a sign of the times. Being 20-something is to be brimming with ambition and action, but empty of stability, certainty.
It’s easy to rush life. It’s hard to cherish this distinct moment you’re in, with full awareness of its transience, irretrievability.
Maybe my simple and proper work is to enjoy this period of rootlessness. Maybe I’ll look back on this essay in a decade and grimace at my youthful ignorance to plant roots when I have my entire life to watch the fruit of commitment blossom. Maybe feeling rootless is required until you find the right soil. A person, a place, a project that calls you — demands you — to plant roots.
I think that’s what it means to be fully engaged in this life. To embrace the periods of wandering and rootlessness with the same openness as the stability and certainty. To trust nowhere is better than precisely where you are.
This period of my life is characterized far more by what I don’t know than what I do. Yet I hold onto the certainty that the uncertainty will end. That there will be a time when I find the right soil, the right place, the right people, and I will plant roots deep into the earth. Buy land somewhere in the country, a place where the world seems to slow down. Build a home, a sanctuary that supports and simplifies all my daily activities. Fill it with love and beauty and books. Start a family.
The secret—the battle that must be fought anew every day—is patience, presence, intention. To cultivate and love each small moment. And trust that everything you seek exists somewhere on your timeline, you just can’t see it yet.
I’ve known that for a long time, but I’m finally starting to live it.
If you enjoyed this, you might also enjoy my essay on solitude and togetherness.
I’d love to hear about your own relationship with feeling rooted or rootless: What does planting roots mean to you? Does the freedom of not having roots feel liberating or terrifying? Do you feel more like an oak tree or tumbleweed?
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This inner conflict between having roots/rootlessness is put so beautifully in this essay. I used to romanticize rootlessness. I probably still romanticize it now. But every time I travel, I long for the daily routines that ground me in place. I know, though, that one day I will uproot my life. I moved here nine years ago and never intended to stay forever.
Wherever you are, in whichever period your life is in, I'm rooting for you. (Sorry, I just had to!)
i stepped into my 30s officially recently, but this feeling of rootlessness in my 20s - you captured it perfectly. there are always places to be, things to do, a lot of confusion, not a lot of stillness. it is an exciting time of life, but it is easy to be overwhelmed by everything that is happening. don't forget to smell the flowers, cliche but true!