There are nights where you still long enough to feel. Long enough for the swirling to stop, the doing and going and checking items off a list and you become a human long enough to know you haven't been one for a while. The guilt when you're not doing something 'productive', the inward feel of enough but taking one more step, the awkward rush of emotion when someone or something throws you off kilter and you have no idea why. That feeling? when you quiet yourself long enough to realize how much you want to be heard, how much you want someone to look long into your eyes and whisper, "Tell me everything"
Honestly? That feels a little rare these days. There's beauty in these days, sure, but it gets lonely. Maybe it's always been a little so--but you feel it more now. Now that your sisters, your safety net you had that first year is scattered all over. Some of them are still around, but you're more of a grown up now, and they come and go, and there are still moments of connection, but more often moments when you realize that you have no idea how, when the gap seems to widen and you wonder. You wonder alternately whether you can do what you're called to and whether it even matters, this calling that is not leadership and seems so blurry sometime. You get annoyed with a friend who seems to see you as ahead, as the one with the answers to homework and all of her ducks in a row, and you wonder if you are truly seen anymore. You wonder if anyone is still keyed in to who you are and how you're feeling and the ways you're growing. You wonder who will remind you who you are if and when you forget.
Thing is? That heart squeeze, it's just a feeling, but it's valid. You were the baby for a year and you mourn that, the fact that most of the people who witnessed your growth, start to finish are gone or going to be gone soon. That none of your peers lived with you, knew you all the way through. That fear that next semester, next year will always be that slow wrestling with the old demon of alone, outcast, incapable of connection. That's your biggest fear, how hard it is for you to connect sometimes and how, when it gets hard, you run. You're afraid that you're stunted, that there's something wrong with you that turns people off and makes intimacy and true quality friendships impossible. You miss them, the ones who chased fear away for a little while, the ones who calmed you and talked down your fears and just seemed to get it. You're it now for some of these girls---but sometimes you need reminding too.
Honestly? That feels a little rare these days. There's beauty in these days, sure, but it gets lonely. Maybe it's always been a little so--but you feel it more now. Now that your sisters, your safety net you had that first year is scattered all over. Some of them are still around, but you're more of a grown up now, and they come and go, and there are still moments of connection, but more often moments when you realize that you have no idea how, when the gap seems to widen and you wonder. You wonder alternately whether you can do what you're called to and whether it even matters, this calling that is not leadership and seems so blurry sometime. You get annoyed with a friend who seems to see you as ahead, as the one with the answers to homework and all of her ducks in a row, and you wonder if you are truly seen anymore. You wonder if anyone is still keyed in to who you are and how you're feeling and the ways you're growing. You wonder who will remind you who you are if and when you forget.
Thing is? That heart squeeze, it's just a feeling, but it's valid. You were the baby for a year and you mourn that, the fact that most of the people who witnessed your growth, start to finish are gone or going to be gone soon. That none of your peers lived with you, knew you all the way through. That fear that next semester, next year will always be that slow wrestling with the old demon of alone, outcast, incapable of connection. That's your biggest fear, how hard it is for you to connect sometimes and how, when it gets hard, you run. You're afraid that you're stunted, that there's something wrong with you that turns people off and makes intimacy and true quality friendships impossible. You miss them, the ones who chased fear away for a little while, the ones who calmed you and talked down your fears and just seemed to get it. You're it now for some of these girls---but sometimes you need reminding too.
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