2005-12-21
The Long Way Home
Right. So it's about time I updated.
Last night I took my last final exam--I didn't take all three hours, and so I got up off my seat and left.
I gripped my coat, walking back to my room, and then I had some time to think, which is dangerous, methinks.
There are so many words and infinitely many thoughts that could've come up at that time, but I simply walked to the sound of my footsteps and life came to me, fragmented black and white bits of it.
My twentieth birthday approaches. I don't even have time to react or to really think about things.
"Tell me Libet, what scares you so much about turning 20?" My therapist sat up in his chair, gripping his pen and looking me in the eyes. He's sympathetic and gentle.
"Just these...deadlines, you know?" I'm trying to look away now, but I feel good that I said it.
"What deadlines?"
"People are going to expect me to be an adult soon. I'm going to have to learn to do adult things, and act like an adult and take things like an adult."
Sitting on the leather sofa, I suddenly felt like I was four, and he simply listened. The funny thing about therapists is that it's their job to listen, though not necessarily comfort. They analyze and give enough feedback, but very seldom do they get up off their chairs to give one a hug at the start of one's weeping.
"What do you think of these deadlines, then?" He asks.
"I think they piss me off. I mean, I'll have to get married soon, and if I don't, I can no longer say that it's okay...because it's what adults do--it's what's expected. Maybe I just didn't finish growing..."
The thought of these "deadlines" is a constant plague. But last night, I don't believe it mattered anymore. So I remembered another time, when we all still had castles by the sea and possibilities were written in the clouds.
Those times, autumns still tasted fresh and the sea-breeze didn't have too many stories, but the ocean had plenty of fairy-tales.
And I thought of returning to any given spot and collect a few shells and stab a twig into the wet sand and sit at dusk like I used to as a small child, and in returning, I think I'd take the long way home.