You can take everything I have, just don’t leave my side.
I’ve never really had a summer like this before, and yet it makes sense because I’ve never been in this position before. Being out of high school, it doesn’t really feel different, so much as everyone is acting different. We’re all grown up now. It’s hard for me to take, and I think that’s because I’ve had the same close friends since middle school. I still, in a way, view them as younger, in the same way I can’t grasp that my sister is sixteen. I guess I largely don’t feel eighteen, working on nineteen. It’s not so much that I feel younger, but I just don’t feel as old as I am. People are sending me cards, wishing me luck on life. It’s now my life, and it’s getting more and more difficult to realize that my decisions are now just that- my decisions. They’re not my mom’s or my dad’s, but mine. I am a legal adult here in the United States, and while I can’t drink/go on a cruise alone/rent a car/rent a hotel room, there are still real consequences to my actions. Ironically, we’ve all probably been acting more reckless, but for the sake of me being an intelligent human, we’ll forget about that.
I’m driving to effing South Dakota on Sunday, and I’m really surprised at how not scared I am. I mean, generally I’d be getting really nervous because that’s just my mo but not so much this time. I don’t know what’s different. I’m going to visit someone that has become rather important to me, and I think I’d still survive if it ended up badly. I think that part of growing up, at least for me, has made me more of an independent person. Now more than ever, I realize I cannot and will not depend on other people for my happiness, no matter what situation I am in. Things change, and while there are few constants, most things are not.
I want to start doing interviews again. It was something I really enjoyed that I had to put on the backburner for school and family issues, but I think it’s about time that I start that up again.
Peace.
