Let Down, Let Go

I don’t even know why I’m not asleep right now considering I’ve had a total of twelve hours out of the past seventy-two. This afternoon I did the thing where I clutched my aching back and said oooff, I’m not twenty-one anymore, but of course, even when I was twenty-one I still loved sleep more than anything besides running around in storm drains and critical analysis of gendered social construction, as anyone who I was hanging out with this weekend could attest because they all knew me back then. It’s been a fabulous time and I am feeling a little let down that it’s over.

Peter and Tracy got in Thursday and I went to bed at 2:30 (and yet I still made the seven-thirty bus, boo yah) and then Rob and Anna got in on Friday and I went to bed at 5:00 but spent another hour talking and then Saturday I was sort of tired so I called it an early night and went to bed at 3:00. There was no time for sleep, between the sitting around chatting, the sitting around laughing, the sitting around eating, the sitting around trying to understand exactly what the World Cup is, the sitting around looking at dirty pictures, the sitting around admiring Tracy’s extensive collection of orange Hup Holland! neckerchiefs, the sitting around practicing amateur chiropracty, the sitting around drinking mo-and faux-jitos, the sitting around getting nervous about my first dance performance, the sitting around having Renee put makeup on me, the sitting around backstage, the sitting around dancing (or whatever), the sitting around taking makeup off, the sitting around having a cupcake taste test, and the sitting around talking smack. Sometimes someone would pass out mid-sentence on the carpet for a couple of minutes but all in all there was too much fun to be had to waste any time snoring.

Everything with me is a little bittersweet lately. When I got back from taking Rob and Anna to the airport Treasa and John were just heading off to the train station, and Ian and Katie were taking off too. The house was completely empty and I was super tired and dehydrated and I knew I should just take a nap or clean the kitchen or something, but I had to sit on the living room couch for a minute and stop myself from looking around for everyone…maybe they were all in the bathroom, or watching more soccer, or outside on the porch? Where’d everyone go? Anna said in the car on the way to the airport that she’s really glad that we all (and I guess “we all” is sort of mutable) get together fairly regularly for basically no reason other than fun and happiness, not just for weddings or whatever. I’m glad about that too, but it’s just not enough, even though it’s great. In fact sometimes I think that I shouldn’t even bother spending time with people I love who live far away from me because it’s never enough and it hurts so much to say goodbye, even (especially) when a super fun time has been had. Is it just easier to not see people, not care about them, not to try to keep up relationships with people you don’t see every day? If I did that I’d lose about two-thirds of my friends…but I have to wonder if I’ve already kind of lost them anyway, being so far away.

I told Anna I’d really really wanted her to come be with me at home, while everything is still (relatively) stable and while I’m still only half crazy. Next time I see her I’ll be a week away from leaving and I’ll have already started to live out of a bag, and I am anticipating that I will be having a little bit of a hard time. I am already having a little bit of a hard time. I’ve been having a hard time, a little bit, for what seems like months and I am just so tired of transition (how many times can I write about this, seriously)…and the hard stuff hasn’t even happened yet. Treasa said this evening while I was finishing up the dishes, “But this is a good change!” It is good change but it’s still kind of killing me, mostly because it’s taking so long. And because I already miss everyone. And because I don’t know what my life is going to look like after August seventh, not in any way. And because I am going to miss everyone.

iTunes is giving me songs about change and loss and craziness, and I still need to be on the seven-thirty bus tomorrow morning, and the clouds in the cloud room are draining away from the edges of my vision as the minutes and days tick by. There is just no good way to be alone.