Sometimes, I'm frightened of really weird things. Well, okay my roommate Testa seems to think that it's weird whenever anything frightens me, but we're excluding that opinion.
There is this weird memory I have. It's probably not a memory, really, but I can't tell what it really is. When I think of it, a picture forms in my mind. It's the skyline of a city, but it's not a realistic sort of skyline. The colors are all flat and bright, as if they're made of construction paper. The image of this, however, wasn't always this flat. I know that it used to at least elude to the idea that it was three dimensional, it was a real place out of my memory at some point, I can feel it. When the image comes to mind, it connects itself to the Columbus Public Library, so I'm guessing it's an image that I saw when I went there at some point as a kid. I get this feeling that it was something I saw, something that actually existed, but I don't know where in the library or by the library I would have seen such a place. It could be something that I saw in a picture book at the library, but even so I would think that I would remember this book, or at least the image as an illustration in some way.
But no. This image, dream, memory whatever it is comes into my mind in the most unexpected of times; most often in my dreams. When I have a real vivid dream, this city scape is in the background. It's been in several dreams over the years, appearing outside the window in airports and in the distance during a deadly capture the flag contest. Over time, I think the image has certainly changed, and I can only sort of sense what it used to be, but it's still there, unbidden, in the corner of my mind.
That's what scares me. I don't know where this image comes from, but it appears at those weird points when I have long since forgotten it, and then it is there again. It's hauntingly familiar and horribly distant at the same time.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Friday, January 20, 2012
Transition
It's the strangest thing to see that life goes on without me.
I spent a lot of time in high school thinking about what college would be like. I think I spent even more time in high school trying to avoid thinking about it. College was this frightening other-world kind of place. It wasn't quite real, and in all honesty, I regarded it the same way I regarded heaven; sure, it existed, but it was so far away that I would never really get there. It was a scary place where the workload was supposed to be so much that normal humans wouldn't function under the stress, and spend their days eating Ramen noodles and having stress attacks about the next test. It was a scary place because I knew that a lot of the people that I had closest relations with wouldn't be there any more.
Then I graduated. In all honesty, all of those thoughts about college sort of left my mind in the transition. In those summer months, I didn't think much about the high school world I left behind, or the fact that I was going to my dream college in a few months. Things became sort of surreal and at the same time so incredibly real. I moved into my ministry house with girls that I had known for years that had all graduated before me - I had dreaded and looked forward to this moment as well. I loved these girls and had missed them terribly when they graduated, but it was still the scariest thing to have to grocery shop for myself, to buy my own toiletries when they ran out, and to manage to figure out how to buy text books and get to class on time. One big change happened after another and it was all so much that it didn't even register to me what was happening.
Now, I'm in my second quarter of college. Life has developed an approximate, if slightly rocky, routine. Finally, I've started to look back on the life that I left.
And realize that other people are still living it.
A picture was posted on facebook that made me think this. It was a webcam photo of, I believe, Kevin, Jill, and Kelley. The three of them were all in my high school homechurch, Alpha, with me. Kevin should be a senior this year, and Kelley and Jill should be sophomores. They are in this world that I left behind, and they seem to be thriving in it. Back when I was in Alpha, relationships were a bit shaky. The group had just started growing my senior year, but people were still getting their bearings, figuring out what kind of role they had in the group. I remember - it seems like years ago now - that one of the things that Joe and I (the two seniors of the group last year) worried about the most was what would happen when we were gone. We were the two leaders of the group, and the juniors at the time did not seem anywhere near to stepping up to fill the spots.
But I guess something changed. I don't know exactly what, but I know that that group has continued to grow. It's gotten better, even without me being there. I know a few college students that have stepped in as leaders because the group is so big, and it looks like people are actually starting to relate to each other more. Kevin, one of the two now-seniors, has at least stepped up to the point of being more than willing to drive people to Alpha this year, which is so much more than he was doing last year (and needed too, because in the past Joe and I were the only ones with cars). I don't know the details of Alpha anymore, I did graduate after all, but I hear updates every week, little accomplishments from the group, how it keeps growing, the breakthroughs that people have. It's amazing, and really weird to think about. I mean, I'm no longer there. Alpha is no longer my home. Yet often I have the thought that I'll be going there on Sunday, just like I did for those four years of high school. Like nothing ever changed.
I spent a lot of time in high school thinking about what college would be like. I think I spent even more time in high school trying to avoid thinking about it. College was this frightening other-world kind of place. It wasn't quite real, and in all honesty, I regarded it the same way I regarded heaven; sure, it existed, but it was so far away that I would never really get there. It was a scary place where the workload was supposed to be so much that normal humans wouldn't function under the stress, and spend their days eating Ramen noodles and having stress attacks about the next test. It was a scary place because I knew that a lot of the people that I had closest relations with wouldn't be there any more.
Then I graduated. In all honesty, all of those thoughts about college sort of left my mind in the transition. In those summer months, I didn't think much about the high school world I left behind, or the fact that I was going to my dream college in a few months. Things became sort of surreal and at the same time so incredibly real. I moved into my ministry house with girls that I had known for years that had all graduated before me - I had dreaded and looked forward to this moment as well. I loved these girls and had missed them terribly when they graduated, but it was still the scariest thing to have to grocery shop for myself, to buy my own toiletries when they ran out, and to manage to figure out how to buy text books and get to class on time. One big change happened after another and it was all so much that it didn't even register to me what was happening.
Now, I'm in my second quarter of college. Life has developed an approximate, if slightly rocky, routine. Finally, I've started to look back on the life that I left.
And realize that other people are still living it.
A picture was posted on facebook that made me think this. It was a webcam photo of, I believe, Kevin, Jill, and Kelley. The three of them were all in my high school homechurch, Alpha, with me. Kevin should be a senior this year, and Kelley and Jill should be sophomores. They are in this world that I left behind, and they seem to be thriving in it. Back when I was in Alpha, relationships were a bit shaky. The group had just started growing my senior year, but people were still getting their bearings, figuring out what kind of role they had in the group. I remember - it seems like years ago now - that one of the things that Joe and I (the two seniors of the group last year) worried about the most was what would happen when we were gone. We were the two leaders of the group, and the juniors at the time did not seem anywhere near to stepping up to fill the spots.
But I guess something changed. I don't know exactly what, but I know that that group has continued to grow. It's gotten better, even without me being there. I know a few college students that have stepped in as leaders because the group is so big, and it looks like people are actually starting to relate to each other more. Kevin, one of the two now-seniors, has at least stepped up to the point of being more than willing to drive people to Alpha this year, which is so much more than he was doing last year (and needed too, because in the past Joe and I were the only ones with cars). I don't know the details of Alpha anymore, I did graduate after all, but I hear updates every week, little accomplishments from the group, how it keeps growing, the breakthroughs that people have. It's amazing, and really weird to think about. I mean, I'm no longer there. Alpha is no longer my home. Yet often I have the thought that I'll be going there on Sunday, just like I did for those four years of high school. Like nothing ever changed.
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Just Did a Christmas Post, Of Course This Should Be a New Years One!
So happy New Years! I mean sure, I'm like three days late for any such statement, but it's still 2012! Welcome to the year of the apocalypse! (as opposed to the past years, which I'm sure no one really thought were apocalyptic in any way)
Well I must say, so far 2012 has brought some wonderful mostly-relaxing evenings with my wonderful roommates. Last night Testa, Shannon and myself watched The Time Travelers Wife on my Mac-shift TV (haha, get it?), and while the movie was not so good (okay, I kinda thought it was stupid), I did get some wonderful time with them. Then the movie ended. I guess we just kept looking in the direction of the screen as we were talking after the movie ended, even as it went black. That, it turns out, was how Laura found us when she walked in. Three girls huddled on the couch covered in blankets because we have zero ventilation staring at a black computer screen. This sounds terribly pathetic. It was hilarious.
Also, Rachel doesn't have pants on. And by "doesn't have pants on" I mean she actually has shorts on but she refuses to admit that, and just keeps saying that she doesn't have pants on.
Well I must say, so far 2012 has brought some wonderful mostly-relaxing evenings with my wonderful roommates. Last night Testa, Shannon and myself watched The Time Travelers Wife on my Mac-shift TV (haha, get it?), and while the movie was not so good (okay, I kinda thought it was stupid), I did get some wonderful time with them. Then the movie ended. I guess we just kept looking in the direction of the screen as we were talking after the movie ended, even as it went black. That, it turns out, was how Laura found us when she walked in. Three girls huddled on the couch covered in blankets because we have zero ventilation staring at a black computer screen. This sounds terribly pathetic. It was hilarious.
Also, Rachel doesn't have pants on. And by "doesn't have pants on" I mean she actually has shorts on but she refuses to admit that, and just keeps saying that she doesn't have pants on.
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