Red Line

Why does every experience have to be a double-edged sword?

Yesterday I took the train down to Duxbury to visit some of my old friends. Anticipation mixed with apprehension as the minutes grew closer to each interaction, but of course the blood pumping frantically throughout my veins was merely overreaction for what ultimately were delightful exchanges. The problem, then, was not in the reconnection, as I had initially feared, but in leaving.

The problem is always in leaving.

Were I to create a pie chart breaking down how often I cry by the various causes of said tears, leaving and being left behind would comprise at least half of the circle. This all, once again, goes back to my inability to accept change quietly and without fuss. My departure from Duxbury was tainted by the knowledge that, though physically I was the one walking away, my friends were metaphorically leaving me behind. Boarding the T in Braintree was a manifestation of this solemnity: my entire car remained empty for the majority of my ride into Boston.

Am I going to spend the first few months of college wandering around, be it literally or otherwise, on my own and without others whom I can call real friends? Will it take months of sitting alone on a cold, hard seat in a subway car until I am surrounded by fellow passengers all heading in the same direction as me? And when, during my journey toward South Station, on my way to better and greater things, will those who take a seat beside me turn and strike up conversation? Will I ever exit through the jerky metal doors and emerge at the station with companions? Or will my footsteps echo singularly throughout the cement and tiled walls of the underground?

I miss people already, even those who have yet to leave me behind.