renewal

to start over, to start again

Two weeks ago, I took the Commuter Rail up to Rockport with a friend. We wandered through that quaint, artsy New England town at the end of the railroad line, with its wood-slat houses and the density of the ocean air snuggling into our lungs. Then, just before we left, we wandered down to the beach, where I stood in the Atlantic for the last time in the foreseeable future, waves rising and falling just below the hem of my shorts.

It has been a strange and unusual summer, full of feelings that I haven’t yet reconciled with myself. I have had my head down the whole time, working on a thesis that is finally on the edge of completion, scarcely paying attention to anything else, but still the new feelings wash through me, as time refuses to halt. The calls and emails of finding a lease, the sudden arrival of movers and the disappearance of all my stuff, and then a flight and a new city—it has all passed through me, and I simultaneously feel like I have not acknowledged it and yet am overwhelmed in it, this strange quagmire of a feeling where everything and nothing is happening to me all at once.

Everything has changed so quickly; even I have become so foreign to myself that it is hard to remember who I am, who I want to be, and what comes next. There are so many strangers that I feel like are passing through me: the feeling of finally becoming a person who answers calls from unknown numbers, because, well, important people are calling you; the feeling of walking into a mattress store for the first time and just hoping that someone, anyone, will be there to explain to you what is going on. I am unsettled, out of step, and everything is wrong, but at the same time I have scarcely noticed a difference.

Time keeps passing.

And, of course, it must be true that I will feel settled again, that I will find my way again, but the thing I mourn most is that I haven’t had time to mourn—please, give me more time, give me the space and time to feel, to understand, to process all the endings in my life, but—

Time keeps passing.

And yet this new life is also beautiful. For years, I have yearned to just control a small area, a tiny domestic isle, far from the student governments and club meetings and all the other activities I threw myself into, and now it is here, my apartment with my own bathroom and a roommate; with all the drawers and wood-paneled shelves and refrigerator, the rent and utilities and everything else. I’ve got a few savings accounts and a 401k and I’ve started picking out restaurants I like, and taking the bus, and seeing plays on weekends when I have nothing to do. I’ve got a job that excites me, and a team that I really like. I have reached the ever-promised-land of real life, and to be honest, I love all these small things, the accoutrement of being alive, of becoming an adult, the feeling of growing up. I could be happy this way.

I am, as ever, still afraid that I am losing myself. I am afraid that I will never make anything beautiful again, afraid that without the structure of school and the inspiration of New England, or with the complacency of a 9-5, I will lose this part of me that wants to write, wants to make music; the part of me that wants to do beautiful things in the world even though it fears that it will never be great. But there is nothing left to do now, I suppose, except to face that fear, and in doing so, I will write for no other reason than that I want to write, and I suppose that will be something beautiful in itself.

At Logan, on my way out of the city I’ve lived and loved in for the past five years, there was a Steinway piano just outside of TSA that anyone could play. It was slightly muted, but the keys had this beautiful, crystal-clear sound, and every chord felt like it could melt away into your heart forever. In the early morning daze, I played songs from musicals at the amateurish level I’ve always played the piano, and people streamed on by, but in that moment, everything felt alright. I could say goodbye knowing that this place had changed me, and I would carry it with me, the joys and the sadnesses, on into a new phase in life.