False Friends

I continue to feel so alone. I am sitting in this grand lounge in my residence hall, the only noise the soft hum of the lights and air conditioner. Classes are done, I just have one paper and four finalsbetween me and my summer. Well... That and 3000 miles. But what is the difference. In a little more than a week I will be back home, back to all the comforts and privacy I grew up with.

I really want to get home, despite knowing there are few real friends back home. But as I sit and think now, there really aren't that many friends here either. I mean, there are people I eat dinner with and go party with... But really? How many of them am I going to truely miss?

My life is full of aquantances, that is what makes me the most sad. I am even cynical enough to say that they have friended me to abuse my friendliness or generisity or power. I want friends, I really do. I just don't know how to make any real ones or if it is even possible.

Will leaving to go back home after my first tear at college be hard? Absolutely. I have had some great times, but in all honesty that was because I was somebody... I had a position of power. I will miss the power, the perks and most of all making lots of people happy. Yes, I will do some missing... I am just not sure if I will be missing many people.

I continue to push the boundaries, and not in a good way.  Drinking is becoming more than just a social activity for me.  I am not quite sure what it is, a release, the taste of a fine wine, whatever it may be I doubt it is healthy.  At least I am not as gone as most people, but for me… yeah.  

Sorry, I don’t make much sense.  I guess it is just good for me to get this out.  If anyone ever did find these they could provide insight or give me a piece of advice… yet I believe these postings are doomed to remain buried deep in cyberspace.  

Anyways, how about an update on my love life? Or lack thereof?  Well... there have been no new relationships but there is this one girl who it seems everyone in the world has a crush on, including my roommate.  My future priest friend even thinks she is really attractive.  Can I pick them or what?  Anyways, I think it is fairly obvious to her that I like her, and my fellow roommate knows. 

I guess I will take this story back several weeks to a bar where we all were.  My crush was there and we were talking, no advances either way though.  Then my roomie comes in, hella drunk, and starts feeling her.  Not sure if she enjoyed it, but I was jealous and I knew that I could hookup with this cheerleader who was there with us.  I wanted to make my crush jealous.  The cheerleader and I ended up in bed making out and cuddling quite a bit.  Yeah… that evening went just like planned… 

It was just a onetime thing, and I really did need to get that lust out of my system, but now as I try to look at this girl who I like and would like to pursue a relationship with I find myself further and further away.  Sure, there are days when we seem close, but I am unsure if it actually is a relationship she wants, if we are on the same page.  I have my doubts and plenty of insecurities.  Maybe I will have another drink… if only I could find a friend to join me.  

Who Am I?

I don't know who I am anymore.  I came into college as a kid with morals, with standards, with past relationships and the hopes to have a decent college experience.  However, my primary focus was class, grades and the degree that was a key to wealth.  

I look at myself now, I can barely even recognize myself.  I feel lost, confused and I have no idea of the direction in which I want to go.  

For example, I just ran around my residence hall to see if I could find someone to go to a local bar with me so I could meet up with some of my upperclassmen friends involved in student government.  Honestly, would I sell my morals for popularity, for the opportunity to become someone in my new school when I started the year?  Would I have run around on a school night asking for a bar buddy?  I know I wouldn't, not in September.  But September has come and gone.  

I thought I was going to be strong coming into this.  No matter what other people did I would dance to my own rhythm.  After all, college for me was necessary for a high paying job.  But something changed.  I got caught up in the vanity of popularity.  I got caught up in the late nights, the flirtation with hot girls and the promiscuous activities and appearances that were necessary to be "popular."  I am not sure if I want to continue down this path.  I feel that while I have forged some relations with popular kids who can take me places or back me in an election, I also feel that I have deserted and left behind the friends I grew so close to the first semester.  I feel like I have lost the friends I truely cared about.  I feel alone.  

((Sorry it has been so long since I posted last, I will try to update more reguarly.)

Heart Aches - sorry for being mushy

When I said that something changed over winter break I meant it.  It wasn’t the smoggy air that nestled on the campus green or the change in classes from the first semester to the second.  No, this change was a change that took place in every one of us, in each and every student that returned home for the holidays and returned with a hope to make the second semester more successful than the first.  

I may be a guy but I am not an idiot when it comes to reading people.  Each and every person has small idiosyncrasies and these can be picked up on.  While someone smiles and laughs they feel a deep pain on the inside.  I would be lying to myself if what happened was a surprise, I dare admit that I too thought of ending my relationship many a time.  The distance that I returned to was just not something I wanted, but I didn’t want to abandon someone I cared so deeply about either.  

My heart aches, yes.  I cared for her very much.  She was sweet, kind, funny, beautiful and smart.  She shared my passion for creativity and the written word, a passion few people I have ever met have shared in.  And in looking for a source to blame I can find none.  We are all people trying to live our lives in a world that is fair to no one.  And though my tears tell me otherwise, I know I must move on.

Relationships

Life is full of relationships and the way we interact with those we have just met and those we have known a lifetime.  I write this now with a sort of apprehensive feeling, though maybe it is just the feeling of emptiness.  You see, as I spoke of earlier after retuning from the winter recess things just didn't return to the way they were.  My best friend from college and I didn't pick up from the same place we left off and something seems to have left my relationship between me and my girlfriend.  I am not even beginning to say that I do not want these relationships anymore; rather, I want them to return to the caliber that they were before the break and continue on strong for some time.  I care deeply for both as well as many others as this case is not solely isolated to these two people, they are merely examples.  

I can not help but feel that this emptiness stems from me and that I am doing something wrong.  I lay in bed for several minutes, perhaps even hours before drifting off into sleep as millions of thoughts cross my mind.  The main thought is my future: a career, a family, a life that seems impossible to obtain yet something that I must obtain soon.  Following this train of thought is everything that must be accomplished on the way to achieving this future I have envisioned, a future I believe God is calling me to, my perceived purpose in life.  

My thoughts have now become scattered and I don't know where to begin, such is my life.  I guess what I am trying to express is the fact that I care for so many people, care for them so much that I would sacrifice so much for them yet, I don't think they are aware of this.  I have this compassion swelling up inside of me, this love for these people who have touched my life in such a short period of time that I do not know what to do.  I have spent my whole life entering relationships that I could back out of easily because I made sure not to get too far emotionally invested and now that this has changed... well... it will take some getting used to.  Let's just hope this change is for the better.

Adaption

We are all constantly adapting to our surroundings as time passes.  From a bike to a car, a crib to a bed, a change is residence or new born sibling we make the best of what we are given.  Yet, there comes a time in one's life when we have control of what surroundings we want to adapt to.  There are several examples of this choice and one that I live with every day was my choice in school.  As a result I find myself adapting to a University situated near a busy city thousands of miles away from home.  I am adapting to an environment I had only previewed for two days at best.  While many would have called my decision rash, there was something inside of me that knew that where I am now was the place for me. 

 

One semester later I am still convinced that I have made the right choice, though I still adapt to changes every single day.  In fact, as I write this right now I feel empty inside.  There haven’t been many significant changes however, I returned home from the winter recess and have returned to my same friends, my wonderful girlfriend, and the same residence hall.  Yet, despite all of this something is missing.  I do not feel that any of us have changed but it has been something that has been on my mind.  Perhaps as the cold weather sweeps this part of the nation people are doomed to feel an empty cold bitterness, though that is probably the West Coast naivety that is within me.  No, I do not quite know what is missing yet but I hope I find it out soon.  Things never seemed to return to the way they were before the break, the routine I had come to know is now gone, and I find myself having to adapt once again. 

 

Is life all about adapting?  Will this cycle ever end?  At times I feel like I want this cycle to end but I know I would bore quickly.  Having experienced this feeling so much I fear that I may be doomed to wander the world in and out of people’s lives, never being able to settle.  Is it a life I look forward to?  That is a question I am asking myself.