Speed Trap

I have three more months left here, yet somehow today was the day that I started feeling like things were truly coming to an end. Maybe because everything has been in the process of getting wrapped up, that now is the time where it just feels like an ending. My mom flys in tomorrow for my graduation and I am cleaning top to bottom, which also involves throwing away alot of the things I held on to. Now more than ever is the time to let them go. But it's funny, because there are other things that are harder to let go of. It's bittersweet. I wish I could say that I was flat out excited about my upcoming move and that I am looking forward with anticipation, and a part of me is. But a part of me always looks backwards to figure out how far I have come and where I am going and that part of me is a bit sad.

A year ago, this is not where I thought I would end up. A year ago, I was moving to London to be with the person I was in love with. A year ago, I was planning on being on the verge of proposing my dissertation and leaving things going while I was gone. A year ago, I was taking huge leaps of faith and just learning to trust others wholeheartedly and not be so reserved. A year ago, things were fine and the world seemed fair.

A year later, I am moving to London but I am going there to leave behind everything I knew. Yes, that makes me sad to realize but I need something drastic and this is it. I am tired of being reminded of a year ago. A year later, and I am on the verge of tendering my resignation letter to my department and my programme. I have known for a long time that this was not for me, but I gave in to what others wanted and a year ago, I listened to everyone else and said I could stick it out. I could not, nor did I want to. A year later, and I am more reserved than I have ever been. Ask the people I know; I have no faith in others and little faith in such a thing as a fair, just world. I have lately come to see why karma can work to one's favour, but I still see no reason to give up my reservations. They have gotten me this far and I know they can take me even further. Few people can surmount them and I know fewer ever will.

At times, I regret that this is the person I have become. At times, I feel so alien to myself. I keep thinking "this is not me; this is not what I would do or say or be like" but it is me. I am coming to accept that; hell, even embrace it. Because I have gone this far and there really is not a way back. I thought there was; I thought explanations and figuring things out would help me, but they won't. What I need is to just reach for the next big thing and let no one else spoil that for me. So, I am moving - to a place where I don't know any peers, where I will be trying to make a new name and reputation for myself. I am moving - and leaving the past behind; one of my friends refers to it as being more streamlined. Perhaps, but the thing about streamlining is that nothing stays attached for long. Nothing slows you down.