Wednesday, April 28, 2004
Two Post Tuesday: The Lost Post (or, The Last Day of Camp)
My drive home is the same every day. The same not-quite-level roads, past cotton and rice fields, through school zones and road construction, coming into town like every good country girl should do as often as she can. Only today, listening to my obnoxiously girly music, rethinking the soap-box lecture I gave 7th period (where I sounded more like my dad than I ever have in my entire life, and used the phrase "personal responsibility" an embarrassing number of times), it dawned on me that all of this as I know it is about to come to a close.Next year I'll come home to a different house with different roommates. Next year C. won't race me to school and J. won't be around to bitch while I silently ponder how he must be the most wonderful teacher in the world. Next year will be different. Not better, not worse, only different. One of those squint your eyes and tilt your head to the left sorts of changes where everything is the same but not. And even though I know that I've made the right decision and steadfastly repeated to everyone (including myself) that my work here is not done, that my heart isn't ready to lead me out of the Delta, sometimes those moments still come when the windows are down and it all gets overwhelmingly sad.
Walking away is something I've always been good at. I've left towns, boyfriends, family. I've gone off to do my own thing in places that made my friends worry and my parents check their checking accounts and insurance policies. This is the first time I've realized that there is just as much perspective in planting one's feet firmly on the ground and refusing to budge.
Even in all of this, when we're far apart and rarely in contact, we are all there. We've been in this together. When it was time to cry because something horrible happenned or simply because the stress and frustration had brought us to the breaking point, there were at least a few someones who knew exactly what you were feeling. I haven't told enough people how much they've meant to me or how much I'm going to miss them. And even though this weekend and next are both to be a celebration, I know now that there will be tears. I know I won't be able to look at these faces, know what we've shared, and not burst out with silly stories followed by that creeping knowledge that none of it will ever quite be the same again.
I didn't cry at my high school graduation. I laughed knowing that I wouldn't stay in touch, that it was the first step in a line of many. I didn't cry at my college graduation, thinking of the car I was buying the next week, of the drive to Oxford, of unknown adventure. In ten days, I will cry in The Grove because I finally get it.
Heather at 5:58 PM
