1.31.2005

and so this is how things are going to be...

...but i don't have to like them.

It is 3:17 on a Monday afternoon, and I am beginning to think that I have seriously overestimated the joy of being done with class by 1pm every day. I found last semester's schedule jolting -- having no real blocks of either class or free time, but continually bouncing between the two, which made for low productivity and a high inclination to skip classes that fell at a strange, interrupting point in my afternoon. And so this semester worked out for me to have a block of class, lunch, and then free time for the rest of the day. Now, with the exception of Tuesday and Thursday, when I have other evening committments, and perhaps Friday afternoon, when I work, I am feeling slightly unnerved by the vast expanse of unstructured time that sits ahead of me.

It is Monday, 3:20pm, and I have no obligations until tomorrow, 9am. A few different thoughts are running through my head. I am thinking about how I should take advantage of some of this time to be my studious self. I could certainly recreate the productivity of the first month of last year, where I spent afternoons with coffee and textbooks, and where I spent evenings with TV and computer and general entertainment. I could pursue my current video game interest, Paper Mario for Gamecube. I could walk into town or drive to the mall or continue to do some spring cleaning on my computer. I could wander the building and chat with whomever is around or I could even take a nap.

And yet my brain feels overwhelmed by the number of options and the seeminly infinite time available to enact them.

And, further, it is moments like this that Matt feels so very far away and I can't stand the thought of being away from him. He's in Baltimore, starting his second semester, and he is studious. And he has a new video game that is truly captivating. So I know that he will finish class, and do a lot of work, and play around, and thus succeed at pleasantly filling the portion of his day that he isn't in class. But I am not so content to follow suit, even though I could spend the rest of my day in an identical fashion. Because, very honestly, any of the activities I could be doing right now seem lacking when I'm doing them alone. You could put the two of us in a room, tell us to do homework, and that we couldn't do anything but homework, and as long as we were together, it would be fine. I get restless when I'm by myself. I feel lonely, and my brain starts to freak itself out in that overwhelmed by nothingness sort of way.

"and so this is how things are going to be..."

Thus sets forth the pattern for the next 2.5 months. I will find myself with so much glorious freetime that it becomes a curse. I will find myself with a plethora of interesting things to do but still sit, dumbfounded by the way that being alone seems so incredibly unnatural once you are married. I will look around my room, which I love, and yet feel cramped and wish that I could be in the apartment in Baltimore which, though small, is home instead of dorm. I will listen to music I like but get sad when the sad songs come on.

Thwarting all melodrama, it is now 3:33 and as I write, I feel hopeful that this semester will iron itself out quickly. I will look to my busier Tuesdays and Thursdays and will, in turn, be grateful for my slower times in the week. I will remember how I entertained myself last semester, or the semesters before that, and I will reacquaint myself with the true joys of being left up to my own devices. I will still be grateful when Matt comes back from class and we can talk about nothing whatsoever online, and I will still look forward to the weekends when we get to see each other. As things look, this whole quick weekend visit thing may turn out to be an every-week activity. And that helps to think about. I'm not stranded from the life that I want to live. I will figure out my routine for and enjoyment of my weeks and weekends, and I know that this will be a good semester.

Things simply seem lonely when you don't have them fully figured out just yet.

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