Rebecca Solnit on Growing Up, Growing Whole, and How We Compose Ourselves

Growing up, we say, as though we were trees, as though altitude was all that there was to be gained, but so much of the process is growing whole as the fragments are gathered, the patterns found.

I am convinced that most people do not grow up, Maya Angelou wrote in her stirring letter to the daughter she never had. We carry accumulation of years in our bodies and on our faces, but generally our real selves, the children inside, are still innocent and shy as magnolias. In that same cultural...