i have had some of the most magical experiences of my whole life in the past three weeks and now i am sitting on my worn-in couch in my family home at eleven o'clock and my heart feels impossibly heavy at the thought of settling into a summertime routine, the thought of closing well-loved notebooks and archiving old photos and placing everything neatly into boxes on shelves while i slip into another round of normalcy. i am only seventeen, i am only seventeen, and i repeat this to myself religiously every day but it only seems to exacerbate the pain because i want to be more than this. i want pressed flowers and sunshine and memories wherever i go. i want anything but this placid in-between state that manifests itself in the low buzz of suburban summer evenings and midday drives with flat, two-dimensional emotion. so much of my life has been spent waiting for something like this and just when it feels like i've started to become alive i find myself pushed back into my old paths and i am still trying to find a way out
