What I hate most about being out of college is the terror of being alone. I didn't think about it at first because I was excited about this new stage of my life, about getting into grad school and finding an apartment and nesting and hanging out with my new roommates. And after all I still had plenty of old connections from Colgate, an immense mailing list of friends with whom I was constantly trying to keep in touch. And now I was close to home and family again and near friends that I had been distant from for far too long. With all that I was distracted for a long time. I felt more emotionally functional than I had in ages and I rejoiced in my independence and felt for a while like everything was okay and even almost perfect.

But it was a fragile balance and it only took a couple of shifting relationships to make me feel as though I was falling. All of a sudden Brookline became a symbol of desolation and everyone I cared about seemed very, very far away. The big fat reality of it is that I have no community here. The city is so full of people that it feels empty sometimes. Where do I go to find the people who are like me? It used to be fairly easy -- just find the band. I don't know why that inevitably worked, but it did. In retrospect, it seems magical that it was that easy and comfortable.

Here my school is not really a source of comfort or community. Most of the people in my program have families and children and other jobs and no one seems to live in the city. My co-workers are mostly the same thing. I am starting to feel as though I am out of place here after all, and this city that I craved to live in doesn't mean a damn thing. And then each weekend as I sit at home with no one to talk to the loneliness sets in and so does the fear that it will always be this way, and they hang over my head and numb it and make it feel strangely heavy and it is all I can do to walk to the kitchen and make food. And a vicious cycle forms, because as soon as I feel that desperately that I need to get out and make friends or I will die like this, I am at once completely incapable of doing anything of the sort -- frozen, paralyzed with fear.

What I miss most desperately is the person I was at Colgate. I became that person almost instantaneously upon arriving, out of some incredible excitement at being someplace new for once, someplace where I was free to do as I liked, where no one knew me and I could have a fresh start. I became sociable, outgoing, enthusiastic (rather irritatingly so at first, if I recall correctly.) I was willing to take risks, laugh at myself, talk to anyone, and was always likely to say yes to any new idea or proposal. Eventually the initial excitement settled down to a calmer way of living, but I always lived well there. I could always be counted on to tell funny stories, or to take responsibility for large projects. There was always someone to talk to if I needed to, and if I was upset or frustrated, in the absence of all else I could go up to the old golf course and watch the stars until I felt okay again. I lived well there.

What I am most afraid of some days is that that person is gone forever and I will never see her again. Today's Amanda is dull and not very social, and lonely and afraid, and can barely be counted on to get her schoolwork done, much less take on anything significant. It is not precisely like a regression to junior high and early high school, where I was defensive and scared like a cornered rat, but it is not the forward progress I had hoped for. Mentally and emotionally, this is not where I thought I would be at this point in my life. Once I became who I was at Colgate, I never thought that person would disappear. But it turns out that there the circumstances were just right for me to be the best sort of person I could be, and now somehow I have to figure out how to recreate circumstances where I can be confident and unafraid and that person can blossom once more.

Sometimes when I get the right people on the phone I can feel her coming back. She tells funny stories and can even make humor out of this desolation and depression, making it feel like it's not all that serious after all. And the right people on the phone make her feel like living like this is okay and natural and nothing to be afraid of and that we are all in this together. And then for a little while I can be that person again and I am okay for as long as I can keep that conversation at the forefront of my mind. And then I can get things done, cook food, even focus on work.

But then I wake up the next day and we start all over again.

So, anyone have any suggestions for making this world seem like home?

I wouldn't hold up the Colgate example as something that was necessarily based on some newfound open-mindedness. You were not going into a new situation blind. You had a network of people you were interacting with prior to even arriving, you had a group (the mentioned band) that made others more accessible, and you were lucky to have roomates that you hit it off with immediately and were in the same position as you.

That being said, that is not to say things can't change, but you haven't necessarily changed as the person you are (or you say were, I stick to are), just the situation has made it harder for that person to come out as the situations just aren't right.

Even though there's a kid here, you can always have a place to remove wallpaper, I promise.

that's true, i was lucky going into Colgate to have a comfortable group of people set up already. i don't have that here, but maybe it just takes a little time for the connections to form that will eventually open up a network of possibilities.

and thank you. =)

We need to hang out. Seriously.

I have a whole pack of intelligent, insightful things to say to this, but it is too frigging early in the morning for me to get to them. I can see them, huddled in the back of my brain, but I can't quite coax them into coming out.