RIP Story: October 10th, 2024

Tired.

My eyes are closed, the constant sounds are already too much but the cars driving over wet roads is too much to filter out. How did I get here? I know I wanted to be in this place, but I feel like I’ve never learned how to live here. I never feel rested. Even when I get some time to myself, I’m too used to waking up early for work to get the extra rest I need. The city finds its voice before I am able to go back to sleep. Everything feels so difficult living here, but where else can I go?

My family is scattered, I’m not sure where half of them live anymore. Friends from back home don’t want to hear from. The only things that talk to me outside of work are the bright lights of the city. Life moves too fast for me here and I don’t even remember how I got into this city. My first day here feels like it was ages ago. I vividly remember my last day on campus. Excitement is how I felt. I was looking for jobs with the piece of paper I never had. A whole new world was open to my skills and willingness to work. It started out so easy.

I stand here now, outside an office party and I feel the string that kept me tied to this idea has been cut. I’ve been spinning ever faster, and all of a sudden, I’ve been cut free. I didn’t realize how fast I was spinning. I was going nowhere. Why does no one tell you when you aren’t moving. I guess you are moving relative to their life story and if you help, you are told. If you don’t help you are forgotten. You either move at their speed and you don’t notice, or you move slower than them, they don’t care, and they don’t tell you the car is still moving at 80, rather than 100km/hr.

I open my eyes, and I see a dark world, noisy, uncaring covered in a mosaic of wisp thin color. Colors I used to enjoy. They were different to the backdrop of my childhood. I stand here now, blasts with tissue paper colors covering the hardness that is this city. I wonder how others navigate this place. There isn’t a handbook. Well, if you grew up closer, maybe this is easier.

The cars are loud, the discomfort hits all of my senses. Today is the first day I start finding my way out of here. I don’t know where that is, but I will find my place outside of the city. I don’t know who or what cut the string in there tonight, but I hope I can thank them on my way out of this place.

Thanks for reading, see you tomorrow.

EPILOGUE: I’ll admit, this is a very personal story. I stared at this image for a few minutes until the wet roads jumped out. I was taken back to late night in Boston after a work event then walking around with some work “friends”. At one point, I had no idea where I was, geographically speaking, and there was not a clear path on how to get back home. Bus or Train, yes, but nothing would have been running that late. I felt like I found myself in a situation where I had no way out. I felt safe, and it was a fun evening, but I felt like an imposter into a life that I didn’t know at the time I would not want to be part of. A recession ultimately made the decision to leave on my behalf.

So, I went with story of a man finding himself overwhelmed, at a crossroads in life. See you tomorrow.