notes from my absence: the patron saint of revolving doors

I think I’m starting to see some kind of a finish line. Even though I’m tired, what’s in front of me feels like enough to carry me neatly into whatever the next part of my life will be. This new beginning feels deserved, and though it hasn’t come easily, its arrival is timely.

I don’t know if I can say my time away was well spent. I’m writing this from the place of the fool, having survived another brief false start that redirected my desire away from the one thing I actually needed. But I think if you were spit out into the world the way I was, you might find yourself with a weak knee bent toward a similar pattern; always occupied with detours led by childish fear disguised as passion, always angling to make a nest out of anything unfit because of a smile.

I’m stepping back, stunned by my ability to be so blind to myself. It’s all the more embarrassing considering that I’ve made the public splaying of my neuroses my job. My relationship with self-awareness is a lot more frayed than I’d originally accounted for. Still, I’m trying not to be too hard on myself—I know I’m young, and habits are tricky—but I’m swallowing this pang of self-frustration dry. You can only surrender to a pattern so many times before all the silhouettes start to look the same, and you have to ask yourself if you really want to devote your one life to being the patron saint of revolving doors.

It’s not all negative. I’m oddly thankful to all the places and people that have allowed me to slip away from myself. Cause I truly haven’t been in a position to be proactive about the things I want to change about me, I’ve only ever been talented in making a hobby out of naming them. I know there is a note left for me on this gift of new clarity, but this time I’m not interested in reading it. It’s pointless to dwell on the past when the future already has its breath on you.

Well, I’m moving into a new apartment shortly. A place that brought me to tears upon entering it for the first time. Someplace that’s only ever existed to me as a somewhere— a room I dreamt of as a child imagining New York, but let go of after reaching maturity because it was easier to accept my life without a perfect home than lie in wait.

Sometimes, I like to tell people this bratty joke when things aren’t going my way: “Well, tough, I get everything I want.” And I just find it funny how a dispensed nothing can end up being so true.

I get what I’m supposed to have, and I always will.

These are the notes from my absence: