Cheers
how often?
how often have you stared at the ceiling wondering?
how many times have you looked at someone and asked yourself so many impossible questions?
how many times have you been sitting alone and you simply put your head in your hands, tears streaming down your cheeks in utter loss?
In the days ahead, how often will you?
It's amazing isn't it? 12 years, all that we have known for 12 years is over. The familiar faces, the comforting voices, the easy predictable schedule, even the inexorable teenage drama associated with people living and working with one another for so long provided its own ironic security...all of it is dissolving as if it were never there to begin with.
And now inevitably, we take the time to look into the dying past. Peering at those around us that we will be leaving with new eyes, and at various futures which until now seemed possible, yet in the face of the grind of time, all those childish possibilities are being mercilessly destroyed.
On Sunday i was at a friend's grad party and for a few hours we were all having a great time. Playing air hockey, laughing at people failing at DDR, just sitting around eating and joking. Then as the night wound down and some people left, we all sat in a circle, ten or twelve of us, and just talked. Sharing stories about work, school, family, friends, enemies, and everything in between. Most of the tales were amusing, bringing a smile or a laugh and at times a sheepish grin of embarassment. Despite this i felt a certain twinge of sadness, because for the first time it occured to me, that this circle of friends, this group of people who have held together for so long, is going to fall apart. Even the people I wasn't that close to, it tugged at the strings of my heart to know I will lose them. As if to confirm this sentiment, slowly people left for home, other parties, and whatever other business they may have had. It's never going to be the same, it never is the same.
And what's most disturbing of all is that it doesn't really matter. Within five years, most of these people will have difficulty recalling my name, and I will return that callousness of memory in kind to them. All the dreams, the crushes, the heartbreaks, the inside jokes, the close call projects...all of it...all will die and we will move on, as if these twelve years were nothing more than an annoyance and the time, effort, and emotions devoted to the people within them just an end to make the means come a little faster, to make escape from this place a little easier.
...But I think it backfired. No matter how many times you say you want out. Despite all the declarations of I hate this town, this school, these people, this life...when the time comes to seperate almost all will wish for one more...
One more opportunity to joke around and punch one another in the shoulder
One more kiss for that sweetheart which was never meant to be
One more awkward attempt at impressing him or her so that they will say yes when you finally gain the courage to ask
One more hollow feeling in your stomach waiting for that report card that you will pretend doesn't matter and throw off as a joke, but you know your parents will kill you and you fear it with all you have
One more time for your face to turn red as you realize you got caught passing that note, or that it's your cell phone blaring that annoying ringtone from that stupid band
One more song that everyone hates but knows the words to and so sing together laughing without a care in the world
One more argument over which movie is better, wendy's or macdonald's, who's hotter, and what boy band should be erased from the planet first
One more teacher that everyone loves and talks about, and one more teacher everybody hates, but still loves to talk about just to make fun of them
One more stare that your crush notices you sending their way, followed by one more dive around that corner, into that room, or under the desk to make it look as though you didn't know they were there.
One more fall on the stairs quickly accompanied by laughter
One more project or homework assignment that you say you'll get right to, then finish just as the teacher collects it, or perhaps not at all
One more day to try and change the world, and one more day to put it off until tomorrow...
Unfortunately, we've lost that chance, this world is ending, the apocolypse of childhood has arrived, and soon all that we will be left with is questions and the knowledge that we will never be able to answer them... If i had tried harder could I have gotten into a better college? Did he or she really like me or was that a rumor? What is their middle name? Did I matter, did I do anything of signifigance for one person in this small world that maybe made it easier and faster for them to leave just as they did for me?
Then there are what may be equally haunting questions that will be answered with our without our consent...Will I stay in touch with them? How many of us won't live to see one another at a reunion? How many will we remember, and will we care if we don't? Will I matter to people as I did now, or become an outcast, or will I remain an outcast, or perhaps find where I belong and people who care for me? ...What do I even really want in life?
No matter how much you would like to leave and never look back, when you go there will be a lump in your throat and a knot where your stomach once resided. Because, no matter how much you disliked where you have been, it's all you've ever known, and to leave that is to leave yourself, to depart from the environment that has shaped and sustained you for 18 years. Yet we must move on, for to stay here and try and hold to that which is perishing is to perish along with it. To disappear beneath the waves of time with the sinking ship of the eternally doomed past. So it is not wrong to mourn the loss of ourselves, and those around us. However, it would be a crime, a travesty, to refuse to rise again, and be built again into new people, and with any grace, better people. And get a new chance in a new world to change and improve it.
Cheers...
Raise a glass, and make a toast
To present, future, and yesterday's ghost
In the name of all that we hold close
For that which we will miss the least and most
To all the laughter,
In the name of all the tears.
For that which will come after
These infinite, yet ephemeral years.
To all the friends,
In the name of those we despise.
For a beginning and an end
Filled with inseperable, yet broken ties
To all the greetings
In the name of all the goodbyes
For that which we once were believing
Now turned to cold, yet comfortable lies...
...Cheers
how often have you stared at the ceiling wondering?
how many times have you looked at someone and asked yourself so many impossible questions?
how many times have you been sitting alone and you simply put your head in your hands, tears streaming down your cheeks in utter loss?
In the days ahead, how often will you?
It's amazing isn't it? 12 years, all that we have known for 12 years is over. The familiar faces, the comforting voices, the easy predictable schedule, even the inexorable teenage drama associated with people living and working with one another for so long provided its own ironic security...all of it is dissolving as if it were never there to begin with.
And now inevitably, we take the time to look into the dying past. Peering at those around us that we will be leaving with new eyes, and at various futures which until now seemed possible, yet in the face of the grind of time, all those childish possibilities are being mercilessly destroyed.
On Sunday i was at a friend's grad party and for a few hours we were all having a great time. Playing air hockey, laughing at people failing at DDR, just sitting around eating and joking. Then as the night wound down and some people left, we all sat in a circle, ten or twelve of us, and just talked. Sharing stories about work, school, family, friends, enemies, and everything in between. Most of the tales were amusing, bringing a smile or a laugh and at times a sheepish grin of embarassment. Despite this i felt a certain twinge of sadness, because for the first time it occured to me, that this circle of friends, this group of people who have held together for so long, is going to fall apart. Even the people I wasn't that close to, it tugged at the strings of my heart to know I will lose them. As if to confirm this sentiment, slowly people left for home, other parties, and whatever other business they may have had. It's never going to be the same, it never is the same.
And what's most disturbing of all is that it doesn't really matter. Within five years, most of these people will have difficulty recalling my name, and I will return that callousness of memory in kind to them. All the dreams, the crushes, the heartbreaks, the inside jokes, the close call projects...all of it...all will die and we will move on, as if these twelve years were nothing more than an annoyance and the time, effort, and emotions devoted to the people within them just an end to make the means come a little faster, to make escape from this place a little easier.
...But I think it backfired. No matter how many times you say you want out. Despite all the declarations of I hate this town, this school, these people, this life...when the time comes to seperate almost all will wish for one more...
One more opportunity to joke around and punch one another in the shoulder
One more kiss for that sweetheart which was never meant to be
One more awkward attempt at impressing him or her so that they will say yes when you finally gain the courage to ask
One more hollow feeling in your stomach waiting for that report card that you will pretend doesn't matter and throw off as a joke, but you know your parents will kill you and you fear it with all you have
One more time for your face to turn red as you realize you got caught passing that note, or that it's your cell phone blaring that annoying ringtone from that stupid band
One more song that everyone hates but knows the words to and so sing together laughing without a care in the world
One more argument over which movie is better, wendy's or macdonald's, who's hotter, and what boy band should be erased from the planet first
One more teacher that everyone loves and talks about, and one more teacher everybody hates, but still loves to talk about just to make fun of them
One more stare that your crush notices you sending their way, followed by one more dive around that corner, into that room, or under the desk to make it look as though you didn't know they were there.
One more fall on the stairs quickly accompanied by laughter
One more project or homework assignment that you say you'll get right to, then finish just as the teacher collects it, or perhaps not at all
One more day to try and change the world, and one more day to put it off until tomorrow...
Unfortunately, we've lost that chance, this world is ending, the apocolypse of childhood has arrived, and soon all that we will be left with is questions and the knowledge that we will never be able to answer them... If i had tried harder could I have gotten into a better college? Did he or she really like me or was that a rumor? What is their middle name? Did I matter, did I do anything of signifigance for one person in this small world that maybe made it easier and faster for them to leave just as they did for me?
Then there are what may be equally haunting questions that will be answered with our without our consent...Will I stay in touch with them? How many of us won't live to see one another at a reunion? How many will we remember, and will we care if we don't? Will I matter to people as I did now, or become an outcast, or will I remain an outcast, or perhaps find where I belong and people who care for me? ...What do I even really want in life?
No matter how much you would like to leave and never look back, when you go there will be a lump in your throat and a knot where your stomach once resided. Because, no matter how much you disliked where you have been, it's all you've ever known, and to leave that is to leave yourself, to depart from the environment that has shaped and sustained you for 18 years. Yet we must move on, for to stay here and try and hold to that which is perishing is to perish along with it. To disappear beneath the waves of time with the sinking ship of the eternally doomed past. So it is not wrong to mourn the loss of ourselves, and those around us. However, it would be a crime, a travesty, to refuse to rise again, and be built again into new people, and with any grace, better people. And get a new chance in a new world to change and improve it.
Cheers...
Raise a glass, and make a toast
To present, future, and yesterday's ghost
In the name of all that we hold close
For that which we will miss the least and most
To all the laughter,
In the name of all the tears.
For that which will come after
These infinite, yet ephemeral years.
To all the friends,
In the name of those we despise.
For a beginning and an end
Filled with inseperable, yet broken ties
To all the greetings
In the name of all the goodbyes
For that which we once were believing
Now turned to cold, yet comfortable lies...
...Cheers