The Epilogue, Part I
I said I was done; at this point, I was pretty confident that I'd written the last chapter of what was the saga of my life on the ol' LJ. I mean, almost 14 months with very little compulsion to ever come back. I'm still considering it closed - consider this to be the epilogue, the afterwards. I don't know who is still around to read this, but I guess that really isn't important. I feel the need to just kind of hurl my thoughts, my feelings, and my words onto a blank space.
It's only about a month until I turn 24. However, 24 will come just as 23 did before it, as 22 did before it, as 21 did before that... I don't remember when I stopped looking forward to my birthday. Though it really isn't so much the fact I don't look forward to them - it is more the fact that I usually dread them that bothers me. I don't expect any change to this year. I will feel as I have for the past few years - lacking direction and motivation, feeling stuck... and worst of all, lonely. Don't get me wrong - I'm fortunate for the friends I have. But the loneliness I feel isnt so much a lack of people, not one where I feel left behind; it is a loneliness that cuts deep to the very core of who I am. It is more than lacking romance or feeling socially stunted... there is this almost indescribable void in me. It is a black hole really. Every black hole has a point where not even light can escape the pull of the gravity - this is called its event horizon. Once anything goes beyond that point, there is nothing but blackness. Likewise, there are things inside me which that I feel are beyond my reach - they have gone to a point where if I look there, I see nothing. Sometimes I feel like I'm not even me - depersonalization, another diagnosis to tag myself with. I'm getting frustrated with how many times I have to be labeled with something in a book, in the DSM IV. I hate that there exists something which can view all this from the outside, never being anything more than a tool of observation, a measuring stick.
I've long finished trying to find the cause as it really doesn't matter - I am where I am, no matter how I got there and since there is no going back... it would be an exercise in futility. Part of me feels like I have come to peace with that - there is actually a lot of things about me and things inside me that I feel like I have made my peace with. And yet I sit in a constant state of restlessness, sometimes I'm not even sure what. I'll just often come to my senses and feel like... I don't know. It is hard to attach words to what it feels like. It is more than just feeling out of place, than feeling I'm not where I belong. It is all very existential in nature and my mind will take anything like that and sprint with it. How can I be so accepting of my shortcomings and weaknesses and yet at the same time suffer from this unquiet state of mind.
At least there is some light at the end of the tunnel to seek. I received my invitation to senior convocation yesterday, which shows just how close I am to completing that part of my life. And that's really all that matters - that I finish. In another time, I would have been done by now and would have had a GPA in the stratusphere. This is a different version of me though, one that will take just getting by the finish line as an accomplishment. But then what? No matter what I do, I know I'm still going to be afraid that I've made the wrong choice.
This is going to be a two part entry. I've got other stuff I want to say, but I need to let it stir a bit longer before I put it here. It will be a little bit more tangible than this.
It's only about a month until I turn 24. However, 24 will come just as 23 did before it, as 22 did before it, as 21 did before that... I don't remember when I stopped looking forward to my birthday. Though it really isn't so much the fact I don't look forward to them - it is more the fact that I usually dread them that bothers me. I don't expect any change to this year. I will feel as I have for the past few years - lacking direction and motivation, feeling stuck... and worst of all, lonely. Don't get me wrong - I'm fortunate for the friends I have. But the loneliness I feel isnt so much a lack of people, not one where I feel left behind; it is a loneliness that cuts deep to the very core of who I am. It is more than lacking romance or feeling socially stunted... there is this almost indescribable void in me. It is a black hole really. Every black hole has a point where not even light can escape the pull of the gravity - this is called its event horizon. Once anything goes beyond that point, there is nothing but blackness. Likewise, there are things inside me which that I feel are beyond my reach - they have gone to a point where if I look there, I see nothing. Sometimes I feel like I'm not even me - depersonalization, another diagnosis to tag myself with. I'm getting frustrated with how many times I have to be labeled with something in a book, in the DSM IV. I hate that there exists something which can view all this from the outside, never being anything more than a tool of observation, a measuring stick.
I've long finished trying to find the cause as it really doesn't matter - I am where I am, no matter how I got there and since there is no going back... it would be an exercise in futility. Part of me feels like I have come to peace with that - there is actually a lot of things about me and things inside me that I feel like I have made my peace with. And yet I sit in a constant state of restlessness, sometimes I'm not even sure what. I'll just often come to my senses and feel like... I don't know. It is hard to attach words to what it feels like. It is more than just feeling out of place, than feeling I'm not where I belong. It is all very existential in nature and my mind will take anything like that and sprint with it. How can I be so accepting of my shortcomings and weaknesses and yet at the same time suffer from this unquiet state of mind.
At least there is some light at the end of the tunnel to seek. I received my invitation to senior convocation yesterday, which shows just how close I am to completing that part of my life. And that's really all that matters - that I finish. In another time, I would have been done by now and would have had a GPA in the stratusphere. This is a different version of me though, one that will take just getting by the finish line as an accomplishment. But then what? No matter what I do, I know I'm still going to be afraid that I've made the wrong choice.
This is going to be a two part entry. I've got other stuff I want to say, but I need to let it stir a bit longer before I put it here. It will be a little bit more tangible than this.