2011-08-30
don't let it fade
What are you forgetting?
What are you leaving behind?
In becoming the person you are continually morphing into, what is being shed and discarded, without you knowing, or with your vague and complacent awareness?
Are the traces still there? Are the etches corroding?
I've engulfed myself into science, into empirical investigations, into carefully designed and controlled collection and analysis of quantitative data, to make cumulative inferences, to inform models and theories, to make progress in addressing research questions and further motivate new ones. I'm engaged in a stable and fulfilling relationship, one that is balanced and pragmatic. Lust and yearning are manifested/relieved with regularity that doesn't detract from the beauty of either of those feelings. Open and honest communication leaves little room for anxiety and insecurity, and while there are inevitably known unknowns, these are dismissed as they are futile to speculate upon, and currently irrelevant.
What is left? Me, exploring the city on my own, pondering my future with a new blend of antsy-ness, one that feels more consequential than ever. Where will I be in a year? I am dying to know. I was dying to know that this time two years ago, at the start of my senior year, and now here I am. In Philadelphia. It still kind of astounds me. I never would have thought.
I don't want curiosity to get the best of me. I must live in the present.
And I can't let myself forget the past. At least not the past versions of myself.
So much of me feels faded, muted, slightly abandoned. I've inevitably been influenced by all the scientists I'm surrounded by (and, with feedback loops, by the one I'm constantly evolving into). I hope I'm not forgetting how to express myself as I used to.
In some ways, I just feel like there's less ambiguity and emotion in my life. Like I said, there are plenty of things I don't know, but they are very specific things: where will I go to school, what city will I live in? Will/how long will we stay together? And I still value emotion a lot, but I don't like to indulge my emotions as much as I think I used to. I like to acknowledge them, sometimes dwell on them if I think they are particularly interesting or important, but I no longer really relish in writing them down. If I feel like sharing them or think I should, I'll do it with someone relevant that I trust. But writing them down and entertaining them feels like rumination. I don't think I felt that way in the past. I think I saw my emotions as inspiration, as something within me with potential to express in creative ways, and that was fulfilling in itself. A lot of the things that I see when I review this memoir, they seem trifling. But others, they strike me as something that I deeply recognize within myself, like a flicker of my myself in some mirror, and I get a glimpse of my own reflection that goes way beyond skin deep, one that doesn't change over time as I age, something more immutable that (I hope) doesn't fade with time and circumstance. But I haven't written something of that sort as of late. Have I lost the ability to be inspired by something, and earnestly muse upon it? I used to love doing that. Maybe I'll start trying again. I don't want to lose that, even if that sort of reflection isn't commonly promoted in my environment (unless you're good at it, and let's face it, when it comes to writing, I'll always be a dilettante).
My life has little Romance, as it is now. I will to re-develop the vision for it. I'll probably try too hard, to start with. But it's important to try. Otherwise it's just going to slip away, and the archives will sound like someone else, a person I'll slightly admire and envy (for their attempts at expressing something- not for their quality in doing so).
Can you still sing with your words?
Can you gape and gaze?
Can you see beyond your own reason?
Will you say your hopes and fears?
I can't let it slip away.
leesah-likes at 9:25 p.m.