what time are we upon and where do i belong
Time to myself, (which I have had an unsuprising lack of over the last three months between my job, living with Matt and a seemingly endless string of visitors) is rejuvanating and lovely but invariably pummels me with overwhelming listlessness. Without the constant distraction of other people and the endlessly repetitive, meaningless but somehow entirely demanding tasks of the marching band, I start to realize how lost I am.
Being lost, which is by definition just being without clear direction, I guess, is not entirely unpleasant. In directionlessness there is the potential for innumerable possibilities. I didn't really know who I was, when I had a plan. When I had one or two or three more years of music school ahead of me and a vague idea of being a professional musician which I expected would just somehow fall into place. I didn't know who I was but I worked under the illusion that I did. I attached myself to ideas, to easy labels that I thought conveyed some type of inert quality. I was a musician, a student, an idealist.
I haven't really lost anything in straying from my plan, what I guess I've gained is the realization that I never had it any more figured out than I do in this exact moment. I have no clue who I am. I have a string lazily maintained relationships that span several countries. I am still a musician, I suppose, but these days I play music for only the most utilitarian of purposes, and when I am presented with creative opportunities, I freeze. I write, but generally only as a means of expelling myself of overwhelmingly irrational thoughts. I bicycle everywhere, I read constantly but distractedly, I cook the same dishes over and over and forget to bother with combing my hair or plucking my eyebrows. I haven't worn makeup in months. I've mostly given up on drinking and recreational drug use, instead I go on long walks in the forest with my roommates until I'm covered with dozens of mosquito bites, swollen and pink. Interacting with other people feels like pulling teeth but I force myself to do it because I'm afraid of getting out of the habit and becoming more inert than I already feel. I wake up next to a person I love every morning, our toes curled together and eyelashes brushing the other's face, but I still can't convince myself that I'm totally deserving or worthy of him.
I've had my snapshot taken by thousands of tourists, protested in a turtle costume and danced barefoot in the street but I still feel like it's not me who's really doing those things, like I stumbled into a play and managed to fumble over the lines adeptly enough to convince everyone I'm meant to be here.
I'm happy, mostly, but I have trouble figuring out just what I've been doing since I finished school. I have formed a serious of vague, half-realized plans for travel over the next 8 months. I plan with the hope that travel will provide me with some kind of illumination as to what my next course is, who I'm meant to become, what I'm really meant to spend my time doing. Although I have to remind myself, in the meantime, that this process of becoming is important, is actually the most important thing. What does where I'm going matter if I can't tell where I am? I know that I will soon look upon these days with intense nostalgia, but at the moment I want to disappear in a crowded bus on a rocky uncertain road in Africa with only my backpack and my journal.
In some ways I have never felt better.
Being lost, which is by definition just being without clear direction, I guess, is not entirely unpleasant. In directionlessness there is the potential for innumerable possibilities. I didn't really know who I was, when I had a plan. When I had one or two or three more years of music school ahead of me and a vague idea of being a professional musician which I expected would just somehow fall into place. I didn't know who I was but I worked under the illusion that I did. I attached myself to ideas, to easy labels that I thought conveyed some type of inert quality. I was a musician, a student, an idealist.
I haven't really lost anything in straying from my plan, what I guess I've gained is the realization that I never had it any more figured out than I do in this exact moment. I have no clue who I am. I have a string lazily maintained relationships that span several countries. I am still a musician, I suppose, but these days I play music for only the most utilitarian of purposes, and when I am presented with creative opportunities, I freeze. I write, but generally only as a means of expelling myself of overwhelmingly irrational thoughts. I bicycle everywhere, I read constantly but distractedly, I cook the same dishes over and over and forget to bother with combing my hair or plucking my eyebrows. I haven't worn makeup in months. I've mostly given up on drinking and recreational drug use, instead I go on long walks in the forest with my roommates until I'm covered with dozens of mosquito bites, swollen and pink. Interacting with other people feels like pulling teeth but I force myself to do it because I'm afraid of getting out of the habit and becoming more inert than I already feel. I wake up next to a person I love every morning, our toes curled together and eyelashes brushing the other's face, but I still can't convince myself that I'm totally deserving or worthy of him.
I've had my snapshot taken by thousands of tourists, protested in a turtle costume and danced barefoot in the street but I still feel like it's not me who's really doing those things, like I stumbled into a play and managed to fumble over the lines adeptly enough to convince everyone I'm meant to be here.
I'm happy, mostly, but I have trouble figuring out just what I've been doing since I finished school. I have formed a serious of vague, half-realized plans for travel over the next 8 months. I plan with the hope that travel will provide me with some kind of illumination as to what my next course is, who I'm meant to become, what I'm really meant to spend my time doing. Although I have to remind myself, in the meantime, that this process of becoming is important, is actually the most important thing. What does where I'm going matter if I can't tell where I am? I know that I will soon look upon these days with intense nostalgia, but at the moment I want to disappear in a crowded bus on a rocky uncertain road in Africa with only my backpack and my journal.
In some ways I have never felt better.