Is it over?
That’s what my mom asked, about my blog. And it’s a good
question, because I haven’t written for over a month. No graduation update,
really, not so much as a peep about my new job, commute, life, etc.
A part of me wants to bookend this blog. It began with
school, I think it should end there. I am no longer being Shipped Off. I am a
Real Adult, tasked with taking my own self wherever the hell next. The idea of
Shipping Off, I think, was the idea of a new independence surrounded by structure.
Now, I’m lucky. There’s a lot of what-nexts and what-wants scattered in front
of me like a jigsaw puzzle. I’m employed at a non-profit! Heck, I have a
salary! And health insurance! I wear trousers!
I am also living at home. So the newness of everything is
juxtaposed with a strange return. This young adult is waking up in her
childhood bed, commuting downtown with her parents, scattering at our various
metro stops. There are moments of extreme excitement, where anything is
possible and it begins to feel like the first steps of a grand adventure. There
are other moments where it feels like a stalled engine. I sometimes feel a tug
inside that is just begging for a
retreat. Because that’s really what it is. I miss my friends and life at
college so incredibly already that I know it’s more than the fact that they
are, truly, awesome. It’s that fear that I’m embroiled in a game where there
are few rules, and those rules are always changing. I want to go back because
feeling at home of in this new world won’t be instantaneous. My base instinct
this time around is to turn around and run. But I won’t.
I’m also lucky because my job is intended to evolve to my
interests and strengths. I get asked about it, and the self-doubt knocks me
over the head every time. I don’t know what
I want to do. A month in, I am proud to have mastered the copier. You ask me
what my strengths are? I can copy things now. And I can write…prettily about things I don’t yet
understand. I am the absolute youngest person in every room I’m in. By
far. Unless there’s an intern. Except
often, the interns are law or grad students and are actually older than me. It
is a weird feeling.
It may be time for a change soon. There may be a time to
take my blogging in a different direction—towards the creative writing or
political direction. But I’m going to leave my options open as I find my feet.
So, it’s not over. It’s just changing.
