Sometimes I forget that the world keeps on turning. I forget that somewhere seven or eight hours away my family is still working and studying and eating dinner together. I forget that there are new senior in my old high school. I forget that my high school friends are making new friends and learning new things in new places without me. Without me. That's the key phrase. Not only am I without the people I've known for years, but they are without me. I don't know if they notice it like I do, but sometimes it just hits you full force. You can feel the seams ripping and the lives being pulled apart. And then sometimes you realize that this is what the rest of your life is going to be like. Your "bed" is no longer your bed. Your "room" is no longer your room. Yes, you may have things in your room or scattered on your bed back at your parent's house, but you can't really call it home anymore. You'll be there for a few months out of the year and even then, it's because you have no where else to go, no permanent home. College students are kind of homeless. They have somewhere to sleep and eat and study, but there is no place where you can say "This is where all of my belongings are and the people I love and where I can get to work easily." Because there are two or three of those places when you're a college student, and to be honest, none of them are really home at all. I have reached a point where I've accepted the alone-ness of college, but still I'm reminded of my little brother or my dad's strange sense of humor or my mom's needless nagging for me to do things. This, I've realized, is growing up. It's not a firecracker moment where you say "I'm an adult now!" like when you turn 18 or 21. It's nothing special or celebrated. It's the little moments where you realize "I have to do this on my own whether I want to or not" when you say "I have to make sure I don't run out of money this semester by spending lots of money on junk food" when you think "I can't hug my mom before bed" or "I can't ask my dad to fix this" or "I don't have a car anymore". Growing up takes time, but sometimes it hits you when you don't expect it. I'm not sorry that I've grown up (and God knows I'm not done yet), but I am a little sad. I left behind many parts of me when I came to college. I left behind a girl who can't call people on the phone. A girl who is afraid to ask for things. A girl who wishes her mom would buy Cinnamon Toast Crunch instead of Cheerios. A girl who is a child. And I don't think I realized this until talking to my best friend/sister from high school just now. I really truly am growing up on my own. There are so many possibilities and opportunities I'll have in the future. And I wish I had someone or someones to share all of these experiences with, but to be honest, I have to have them alone. I have to take the bus alone and order over the phone alone and explore my campus alone and walk to class alone and eat in the cafeteria alone. I have to be alone to learn about the world. And this is when I realize how people, mainly twenty year olds, become who they become. They don't have a guidebook or a friend or parent telling them what to do or where to go or how to live...they simply live how they want to live and that's that. They grow up, and they survive. And that is what will happen to me in the coming years. Whether I want it or not. I will survive. I will thrive. And I will grow into something beautiful.
"So much to say
But no words to convey
The loneliness building with each passing day
But I'm getting used to it, you have to get used to it"
- Broken Heart, Motion City Soundtrack
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