Welcome to Readers’ Week 2024, where we celebrate the thoughts and voices of our blooming community. This year, we invited our readers to share their thoughts on the theme “Clean Slate” as the academic year restarts - unfolding a tale of fresh starts, new beginnings and untold stories. From an array of incredible submissions, we’ve chosen the top seven, and as difficult as that was, these pieces best embody this powerful theme.
As we take you through these seven submissions, they bring to you their own interpretations. With that, we present to you the seventh piece, which truly captures the essence of starting anew!
BY - 
I approached the end of the tunnel that had been carved out for me. I felt a sense of opulence tingling at my fingertips as I would finally get to survey the world beyond me, deeper than I had ever seen it during the course of my life. I had scrawled up all the things necessary for my survival in this world up until now, but entering into this newer landscape made me realize how little I knew about everything, and that the slate I had been clinging to would no longer prove useful. The inertia of life was crashing into my being as I slowed down from the chase that my life had been to finally observe the world at a gentle pace.
The azure skies had never looked so beautiful, reminding me of a past long bygone, when my horizons were no more than a few steps from my abode. I reminisced about the time when life was sheltered and simple, much more comfortable than these grander vistas I was becoming a part of. I used to sulk about waking up early for school and wished eternally to become an adult by the next day. Now, with my knowledge much more than when I was a young’un, observing the same world as I saw years ago feels a bit different—less vibrant but more welcoming, less alien but more intricate in its nexus of events holding it together. It had truly been too long since I had looked upon my surroundings with the intent to experience them rather than having a tunnel vision to a singular goal. It feels as if the veil of innocence and childhood has finally lifted, laying down the true horrors of the adult world, as I shed the protection of the sanctuary that I was a part of to be a denizen of reality.
As exciting as it was to embark upon a fresh phase of my life, I also realized that I had experienced this same feeling earlier in my life as well, though this time the experience was quite amplified compared to before. But the fact that I had been pitted in the same situation, regardless of the intensity, did make me rethink a few key moments of the past: the first day that I ever attended school and just waited for the day to get over, to finally see my parents in the crowd of people and to leap toward them with both my arms outstretched, to go back into the lap of familiarity after spending the day in a strange institute, only to experience the same feeling when we walked out of it for the last time. By that time, the institute had become a part of my being, something ‘strange’ that I had eventually etched into my existence, something that I didn’t want to let go of now.
I also remembered the time when I lost some of the closest people to me, when the true transient nature of bonds struck me, when the concept of permanence and stability seemed illogical, when all I wanted was to have those people back, to wake up from the nightmare that I was having, to find them sitting right next to me when I woke up, warmly smiling over my face just to feel that sense of home again. I started to choke up as tears began to brim at the edge of their precipice, threatening to fall over as it occurred to me that life had been a grand stage hosting the same show, with the same theme of ‘letting go’ of what you had built, and finding home in new people and new places, starting fresh from a clean slate.
Though it can be quite saddening if the nature of our course is to cycle through the same themes over and over again, the magnificence of what my footsteps had led me to was certainly remarkable enough to give me the courage to pick myself up and build something new, despite knowing full well that all of it could tumble down like a house of cards at any instant. As much as I anchor to my past, this new world that has been unveiled to me will surely keep me moving forward.
All of this novelty, though, makes me question what kind of person I will become after all of my goals have been achieved, and how I will define a new purpose to follow. The thought makes me ecstatic but at the same time suffocates me with dread. The slate that had been a companion to me, finally wiped clean, may be to make space for new experiences or may be discarded eventually, maybe to get out of the cycle or just maybe to start a new one.
@valueplan for sponsoring this year's Readers’ Week. Moving forward, we'd publish a guide on how to create a Hive account and then have our readers navigate to the posts which they want to read and upvote. We'd also encourage them to bring in their friends and family and become a part of this wonderful community that is Hive. 
