I always find it hard to conceptualize years on the calendar cycle. No matter what, even though I’m no longer living according to an academic calendar, the year feels “over” in May and “new” in August, with the summer being a limbo of sorts, full of possibility.
May is approaching, and so, naturally, I’m feeling reflective. I’m more aware of the past year today than I was in January when 2014 ended. Since last April, so much has happened. It didn’t feel so at the time. Now, I’m overwhelmed thinking about it:
I finished my thesis, unsatisfied with it though I was.
I graduated. I was in total denial the whole ceremony, stubbornly pretending that after the ceremony, we’d all go back to our favorite corners of campus and town, that evening congregating in the library for coffee before meandering the quad or girl gabbing in the art building, as always. That life would continue normally. Life would (and did) continue, but to this day my stomach still lurches when I remember sitting on the sticky metal chair in the heat on the football field, and realizing how uncertain the next day, week, month, and year looked.
I returned to Kirksville only once, in June. It felt simultaneously like breathing again (a grasp at “normalcy”) and like a heartachey end of an era. They say you can never go home again.
The year since last May has seen four jobs, and a professional progression I never could have expected. I went from 10 hours a week at my beloved university’s special collections library, where I mended 100 year old posters and documented small town ephemera. Upon graduating, I lurched first into 17 hours a week at the museum info desk, followed by 40+ hours a week in a cube outside the offices of the curators I’ve idolized for years, to now: a full time, permanent job that involves a desk and an office of my own with a door that closes and a library and a lot of paintings on the walls, propped against shelves, and in the back of my van. How did this happen? It bewilders me to this day.
There was a long, serious relationship, the overall emotional climate of which was sadness. There was a short, less-serious relationship, which was incredibly fun though lacked the roots to develop into what either of us were seeking. I braved the wild west of online dating (#yolo) which yielded minimal romantic results and a bevy of quirky stories. This is something I never would have imagined trying, but I’m glad I did. I doubt I’ll be trying this again in the future, but I’m glad for the memories it contributed to the last “year.”
I lived at home with my parents. I got an apartment of my own. As we speak, a lease sits on my realator’s desk, ready for me to sign, and an extra set of couches sits awkwardly in my parent’s living room until I find a truck to put them in and send across town.
I rediscovered my hometown. I saw some live shows, dancing with Sylvan Esso and weeping with Sufjan. I began curating a small local gallery and stumbled down rabbit holes in my local art world I didn’t know existed. I learned to cook. I started running. I started to address my fear of church.
I started a book vlog, forgot about it, remembered it, and read insanely all the while.
I think that about covers everything.
It’s just so surreal that I had to put it somewhere other than my own mind. I can’t even imagine what the next months hold.
