HolycrapI'mgraduating. In June. Everything is happening in June! Graduation, Boyfriend moves in with me, Ragnarok, possible full-time status at work, "real life".... I've already been taking care of my shit like real life is here though. It'll just get that much more scary once I don't have school as an excuse for why I don't have a real job. It'll be interesting to see how Boyfriend and I get along once we must deal with each other on a day to day basis. After nearly three years long distance... can we actually live together? Hell, we haven't even ever lived in the same city before. He's never lived on his own. I don't doubt he'll be fine but I expect some random unforeseen trouble. He's never declined to help out with dishes or other mundane crap when he's around, so, I take that as a good sign. I think in all honesty I'll be the one who has more trouble adjusting. I will have lived on my own from mid-March to the beginning of June. I'm sure I've already developed strange habits. I'm trying to keep up with dishes the way he already said he wants to, keep things picked up and not have random clothes hanging about in the living room or whatnot... I do struggle with that last bit tho. There are currently two pairs of pants and a shirt in here. I know his actual physical stuff won't take up much space. He doesn't own much, definitely nowhere near the amount of crap I have. He's just got a very small number of books and DVDs, some clothes, and his computer. Not bringing any furniture, no sentimental trinkets and crap like I have. (Which I know I need to get rid of it's just a long and painful process and I can only do so much at one time as they lose their sentimental value or I lose steam with cleaning and I swear to whatever god there may be that if he tries to speed up that process I will give him so much shit for it.)
Plus I have no idea where we'll be come September. The sublet is done at the end of August so we need to spend the summer job and apartment hunting. That's where the real-life scary thing begins. The uncertainty. I think I can only handle it because I don't handle it - I avoid thinking about it as much as possible in order to avoid a panic attack. Which I know I can have, since I've had one before. I don't think things will ever get that over whelming again, but it is still terrifying to remember. Gripping the edge of my dorm desk crying, and gasping for air, totally unable to control my breathing. I had to spend ten minutes just trying to get my shit together. That was the point in time I was about to change schools, my parents were getting divorced, I was involved with an asshole from six states away, and I thought my Grandfather was dying (I had just gotten off the phone with my mom who said I needed to come that weekend or asap to see him one more time.) Things have worked out quite well since then. I mean, it's taken a few years, but things are sorted out better. I don't have to deal with my Dad's freakouts over my Mom, that asshole is far in the past, I love my new school, I very much love my boyfriend now, and Grandpa is... well he's okay, but he's almost 93 so that's about as much as I can say for the guy. Doesn't do much these days, never really had any hobbies outside of work so he just... sleeps, mostly. That's another thing I try desperately, desperately to avoid thinking about. I'm the youngest grandkid. There are eight great-grandkids now. He. is. old. It's near his time to pass. It still crushes my heart and chokes me and blinds me with these stupid wet things in my eyes. I've been to a lot of funerals. But I was so young. I didn't understand, I didn't grasp it, hadn't been alive long enough, hadn't been around the people enough. Now? Now if anyone were to leave my life like that I would be beyond crushed. Knowing that my Grandpa will soon be leaving us doesn't and won't make it any easier to endure. I miss him already. He has a small stroke, and he hasn't been quite the same since. He doesn't tell stories anymore. I miss that more than anything. He is a good man. Was in the army band during WWII, barely avoided being shipped overseas, met my grandmother. Oh those old pictures of them... she was so lovely. I wish I had really known her. She was already slipping into Alzheimer's by the time I was aware enough to begin to understand that she was a person. It's hard when you live in a different state. Even if you drive over there fairly often it's still not the same. These previous deaths did not affect me so much because in truth I did not know them. My uncle, my aunt, paternal grandfather, maternal grandmother, any great-grandparent... I was too young and too far away to have known any of them properly. So knowing this, I have made more of an effort to see my grandfather. But now, it's so difficult, I... I can't even sustain a conversation. I can't hear me half the time, and I feel like even when he does there isn't much more to say. How can I tell him about my life, when he can't hear me, let alone begin to understand when I try to explain the concept of Dagorhir? I can't ask him about his life much either. He still has some trouble recalling words, from the stroke, and seems lost in his own sentences sometimes. He will be the first person I will truly lose and it terrifies me. There is no being ready for that. Even writing this the stupid water in my eyes threatens to take over completely, to lose myself in the streaming world of pain and loss, when he is not yet gone. It's one of the moments when I feel so much I cannot handle it. Even now as the wet recedes from my eyes my throat remains tight. There is some much written, filmed, etc about loss, but in reality... it's such an isolated world to be in. You become the center of your own universe filled only with your pain and longing, surfacing only to make a brave face for the world which truly exists.
Therapeutic, this writing is. It lets me experience the emotions without being consumed by them.
Times like this I wonder how much my writing is being influenced by my reading of Latin and translation of Latin poetry. It's such a different way of communicating from what I experience on a daily basis. My turn of phrase has become strange. And not just from Latin, but everything I read. I pick up words like mollify, erudite, or lurking. Then I use them in real life situations and it just throws people off. I think it is more acceptable to use these words in written form, but not verbal. We expect more from a book. And I wonder how I would be as a writer... undisciplined, writing in fits and bursts, I know that much from this blog here. If it were my profession... how would I handle that? Probably burn out quickly.
Instead I am striving for a different profession: teaching high school Latin. Hell if I know whether it's a good idea or not, but I think it's something I could potentially be good at. So I'm giving it a go. Applying for some private school jobs, in various states. If I don't get one, I think I'll go back to get my masters in Education. Either way I want to continue taking some Latin classes for myself. Wherever I end up. Maybe just auditing classes? I don't know how that works. But it's easier to focus on Latin if you have someone else to motivate you, like a teacher or a friend to translate with you. It's more than difficult to try and translate something on your own. Too much room for error, in my perfectionist opinion.
I think I've exhausted this creative burst. It is time for night to cover my eyes in sleep.
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