First column of 2009!

1.5.09

My New Year’s Eve traditions are few and far between. They never involve alcohol, and usually do involve going to bed well before midnight. The only thing I have done with any regularity is write a yearly reflection. I’ve done this since I was fifteen, and I have all of them stowed away in a folder on my computer. Every year, I write the new one, and then go back and read my retellings of the past.
Usually I am just surprised at how every year, I’ve said the same thing—that I’ve finally found a good guy, that I can see through all the societal crap around me, and that I’m surprised at where I am in my life.
When I reread everything this year, I was struck by the amount of lying I did. And it’s not like anyone was reading these—I had no one to impress. I was simply lying to myself. The best part was that I actually acknowledged the lies I was telling myself. Last year’s reflection said, “I know I won’t be happy, but if I keep telling myself I will, then it will come true and I will have to be okay with that.”
Wow. Depressing. I’m not sure which is worse—being twenty and feeling trapped, or feeling like my happiness meant so little.
Yet with this entrée of depression, there was a hearty side dish of urgency: the intense feeling that many college students have of knowing there is something more out there. It’s such a vague statement, but we all feel that way to some degree. There’s something more than this relationship, this school, this class, this part of our lives. The fact of the matter is, these parts of our lives are being written off as unimportant as we constantly search for the “something more” we believe is out there. Cynical as I am, I can’t stop believing in “something more.” I don’t mean that religiously, but rather that there is something better than the life I am living right now.
At some point, I think I am going to have to stop thinking this way. I’ve begun to notice that I typically don’t think that way—I often find myself saying, “well, this is as good as it gets.” But when I start analyzing my life and the ways I’ve gone wrong, I start believing that my life could be better. That I could be better. But as Voltaire alludes to in Candide, if this is the best possible world, then I sure don’t want to see the worst possible world. Likewise, if this is as good as I can be, please don’t make me see the worst I can be.
Though my New Year’s traditions never include resolutions, I think it would be a good idea to stop believing in the “something more” of life, just for a little bit. Believing that the grass is greener elsewhere motivates me to some extent, but the rest of the time, it just sabotages my relationships and other good things in my life.
In my reflection for 2005, I said that it had become necessary to forgo elaborate fantasies in exchange for a pretty good reality. I’m sure I was referring to some completely ridiculous situation, but I wish I’d taken my own words to heart. If I could stop believing in happily ever after, a thesis statement that is tight enough for Dr. Summers, or getting all A’s, I could breathe for a moment and enjoy what was happening in my life, no matter how messy or poorly worded it may be.