Ending

I could try and explain the way I feel right now, but fear efforts would be of little use. There isn’t a word for this combination of emotions. There isn’t a word for this view of life. I don’t know what’s going on with me in the slightest and I worry that blogging brings out this sadness in me that I might overlook otherwise. Sometimes, despite all of my beliefs about dealing with emotion, I wonder if it would be better to just ignore anything but happiness. I wonder if it would be better to just overlook the constant questioning.

I think it’s just this point in summer. Something about early August evokes an inquisition about my life as a whole, where I’m going, where I’ve been. In an effort to answer, I begin to tear myself away from everyone, trying to get back to me. I wish there was a place for me to disappear to for a while. I wish I had some form of refuge. The world suddenly seems so crowded and I find myself becoming claustrophobic in it. I can’t sem to escape.

I don’t want to write anymore about sadness, but again, can’t seem to escape. If I don’t write about it, I’ll never deal with it and the avoidance is what’s making it so painful. So, here it goes. Soon, everyone will pack their things and head off for school once more. Soon, everyone will leave. That's something that I miss about Kalamazoo, beyond the people of course. I miss being able to pick up and go. I miss the change of scene. I miss having more than one home. I miss being the one leaving.

I like that I stayed here. I do. I don’t regret my decision, but if I were really and truly confidant in it, I wouldn’t have to keep reminding myself of that. I wouldn’t need the reassurance of constantly telling myself, "I don’t regret it." I wanted to live my life with no regrets, because I think regrets waste time in life, but I have them. I have choices that I wish I had or hadn’t made. I have moments that I replay again and again in my head, wishing that I had said something different, wishing that I had said something at all. I am constantly struggling between the desire to be perfectly content and the desire to do everything over again. It shouldn’t matter either way as I can’t change the past, but somehow, the way I choose to deal with my past inevitably changes the way I deal with my future.

I have no idea what’s in my future, and I both love and hate the uncertainty. It’s all about the potential of tomorrow. Potentially, my future will be an amazing adventure filled with unconventional events and characters, a real roller coaster of experiences. Or potentially, and this is my biggest fear, I will wake up in five, ten, fifty years, and be in the exact same place. I watch my friends figuring out their futures and I worry that I’m being left behind.

That’s what this current pity-fest is all about. I feel like I’m being left behind, and at the fault of no one but myself. It’s gotten to the point where at least five times a day I stop and ask myself "what the fuck am I doing?" It applies to both the specific moment at hand and the larger picture of life. I feel really lost, and I know how stupid and cliched that sounds, but I do. I just don’t have anything figured out and instead of dealing with it, I just avoid it until thinking about it ties my stomach in knots. My stomach has been tied in knots for weeks.

I have yet to put into words the biggest factor in my fear about the future. Tommy’s leaving. I don’t know exactly why this is torturing me so. Of course I knew I would be sad that my best friend is going to China for a year. I knew it would be hard to say goodbye. I just never realized that it would be this hard. I’ve never been good at goodbyes. I’ve always been good at it in my head, the movie script speech of what we’ll each say, the last words, the soundtrack starting in at the emotional climax. In reality, I start acting like an asshole and avoiding people and pushing them away so it won’t hurt. Even now I’m starting to cry knowing that it’s true.

I feel like this is the end. Not for my friendship with Tommy, but for a life that I’ve become so accustomed to living. For the first time, this set of goodbyes really feels like goodbye. Everyone’s beginning to grow up and move on, and I’m still here, lost and confused. I’m still wandering around the hallway of childhood looking for the right door to go through. Returning to school doesn’t appeal to me, but I wouldn’t know what to do otherwise. I don’t want my life to feel like a default, but I’m scared to be proactive and make alternative decisions. Meanwhile, the walls are closing in around me. I’m starting to feel trapped in my own life. I pull away because it’s easier for me to feel like I’m the one leaving. I’m the one making the choice. I don’t want to feel left behind. I don’t want to feel abandoned. I just want to feel ok again.

I need to stop before I fall back into the series of depressing entries I begin to write. One always flows into another, and I end up causing worry and sadness among those who are reading this. Don’t worry. It’s not a cry for help or a desire for pity. It’s for me. It’s an explanation to help me understand why I do what I do, why I feel the way I feel. It’s my therapy. Eventually, I’ll be able to help myself. I’ll be able to take that step towards understanding and accepting the person I am. I’ll be able to find my door and confidently walk through towards the next chapter of my life. But for now it’s nice to have an outlet to express my sadness. My movie script endings are never put into production, but perhaps this is the best way for me to fulfill their intent. Perhaps someday I’ll learn the right way to say goodbye. Perhaps it will be sooner than I think, as the act comes to a close, and the final light fades out.