Running – a reflection

Running – a reflection

Last night, I sat and cried in a cold hotel room while my phone charged on the floor next to me and two of my friends tried to comfort me. I was crying because we were on an overnight field trip, several things had gone awry already (I don’t even know how half of it even happened because how the everloving fuck does a hotel forget reservations for SEVENTY PEOPLE), everyone was stressed, and I couldn’t sleep in the same room as my friends because I had to sleep in the same room as my mom in the same bed because there was only one bed in our room and no couch. It feels so ridiculous looking back at it now that I’m back home at my desk surrounded by familiar sights and running my fingers across the keyboard I’m so used to using nowadays, but I’m also not ashamed to admit it because last night struck me with a strange sense of inspiration that I’m not quite sure how to describe. You see, ever since I was very small, I was really sheltered. I’m an only child, so my parents are very protective of me and they control a lot of my exposure to the outside world. As I’ve grown and made new friends, I have started to learn that this is a case that is rather embarrassingly unique to me in the places that I frequent, and thus I’ve grown into something of a good kid trying to remain good while also escaping the rock they live under as much as possible. It’s really weird, so let me elaborate further:

I have almost no fucking clue how to function on my own because for much of my life I was sheltered and just sort of sat there while my mom made the decisions for me, but I also want to pretend like I know how to function on my own anyways by avoiding my parents as much as possible. I’m stuck between a rock and a hard place because oftentimes the world I so desperately want to be part of and escape to is also quite a scary place, but the safest place I can think of is hiding under my parents’ wings like a coward. For this trip, I was originally going to be put in a group of girls I barely knew, which was one of the most anxiety-inducing things possible since girls I don’t know usually tend to dislike me, so I got my group changed to be in a group full of people I knew. This only happened because my mother also chaperoned this group, and she was kind enough to take me in. I love my mother, but I’m also sort of enmeshed to her in a way, as she is very schedule-oriented and likes to control little details, and I give in because trying to fight is usually a waste of energy I don’t even have. For the sake of my friends, I did my best to get her to loosen her grip a little and let us lead the way (and succeeded), but unfortunately I am always on a leash as her child and I knew the sense of freedom I was getting wasn’t going to last. I wanted to prolong it as much as possible, so you can imagine how upset I was when I had to go back to being stuck again.

So first I got into an argument with my mother that night, then I visited my friends’ room for a bit. That is how I ended up crying on the floor of a weirdly-shaped, cold hotel room with “I Wanna Be Yours” by the Arctic Monkeys playing in the background while my friends tried to comfort me and my phone charged by my side.

We talked about a lot of things that night. Parental issues we each had, where we wanted to run to where we grew up, random weird teenager shit. I learned a couple things about myself last night. I learned a couple things about them, too. I will not disclose what I learned from them because that is their information to share about themselves, but I will share some of the things I learned about myself and the ideas I had in the same way that I wrote them in the notes app on my phone that night.

  • Redwoods?
  • Midwest?
  • Canada?
  • Iceland?

I could probably think of more if I tried, but that’s all I was able to come up with that night, since eventually I got tired of being sad and went on to actually have some fun, but not before I came to the decision that I will likely never settle in one place forever and will always find time to visit other places. The world is too wide and beautiful for me to see it all, and I still like my sense of stability, but I also cannot possibly imagine being boxed into one place for my whole life. I was raised to love travel and appreciate beauty all over the United States and beyond, and I’m going to lean into that love for the rest of my life if I can. Maybe it’s just a result of being boxed in for so long, maybe it’s my higher calling, maybe I won’t even end up doing it after all, but for now it feels right, and that’s the most I can ask for.

That said, I’ve got nothing left to say, so back into my little lair I go again for now until I feel the need to exit it once more. I feel like I should add something inspirational to end this off, so here goes nothing:

Get out there and go live your life. 

Ta-ta for now, folks.

-Potato

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