Happy Memories: Sofas and Car Rides
Note to self: It's been a few years since I last used Tumblr to post my thoughts. But it occurred to me that some memories can't be caught on camera, and instead could only ever be recorded in writing. Knowing me, I will someday want to look back on this and scroll down my Tumblr posts to see what the Ely of days past wanted to say. Or even better, I may someday forget this ever happened, or what it felt like, and all the nostalgia will bring these feelings back to me. To the future me, I hope these memories are never tarnished by any struggles I later face. If indeed they have been, you know what to do before you read.
I've moved away from home to go to school. This was my first semester, and I've struggled to make any new, authentic friendships. I've come in as a transfer student to take classes with junior and senior level students. The biggest struggle I’ve had in my new school at the University of Florida has been loneliness. I’ve never been one to talk much at home, but there’s nothing I enjoy more than sitting down with a few people and just talking for hours about anything and everything. I hadn’t had the chance to really do that in this new home.
I’m on vacation. I came back to my other home: Miami. I’ve had some great memories so far, specially seeing my family gathered, without a single drama outbreak during the holidays for the first time in years. But today was a bit more special, because it was such a personal experience. I came to realize that it wasn't the Miami culture or even hugging my own family that I've missed the most since moving away (though I did definitely miss it a lot; it was hard to sleep at times after months without a single hug from anyone). What I missed the most was having a friend.
Today, Judith woke me up to spend the day with her. After we went to the mall, we went to visit her uncles. We sat on their couch and talked for hours there. There were no pauses in the conversation, no awkwardness. I didn't say much, but I wouldn't have enjoyed it as much if I had been more involved in the conversation. I watched the three of them react to one another, and smile, and nod, and throw their hands all around, and furrow their eyebrows, and shake their heads, and clap their hands when they laughed too hard. I heard the tones of their voices fluctuate, I heard them speak over one another, I caught a lie in one of their comments, I watched another catch on to the lie, I understood one’s frustration for not being heard over another, I saw gratitude when they were later acknowledged. I joined them in conversation over our future careers and choices of study. I laughed with them over parodies of President Obama’s speeches. Each one of us assigned importance to something, and expressed it differently. Some of us repeated our conclusions, some of us shook our heads and took on a serious expression, some of us elaborated with details, and some of us changed our tones. It was so…. human. And it felt fantastic.
But the best part of the night was our departure from her uncles’ home. We drove for at least an hour, running another errand, going nuts over music. The volume set to max, the windows rolled down, my loose hair dancing in the wind; we jammed. From pop to rock to rap to latin to ballads. Beyonce, All American Rejects, Pitbull, Ke$ha, Becky G, Daddy Yankee, P!nk, in no particular order. It was dark out, and the streets were mostly empty. We’d speed up if there were no stop lights, make faces, sing lyrics, dance like absolute idiots, laugh. When the lights were red we’d calm down, snap our fingers, mouth the words, avoid eye contact with adjacent drivers. We’d scream way off tune to high notes, act out words, point at each other, laugh so hard we could no longer sing. We sang of heart break, we sang of anger, we sang of striving, we sang of partying. We let go of the wheel, lifted our backs from our seats, threw our arms out the windows, let our fingers extend as far as they could, and curled them into fists, pointed at no one, always laughed. We ended with the perfect song: making our way down town, driving fast, cars passed, and we were home bound.
I made faces and did things I can never imagine doing in front of any other person in this world. These are the memories I’ll bring up the next time I’m feeling sad and alone. I won’t get to do this often, and I only have another week before I go back to school. Back to a world without friends I can be pointless and silly with. But that’s okay, because memories like these are the happiest, and their rarity can only make them all the more dear to me.
