The End
I’ve talked before about life having chapters. I’ve wanted to write mine for so long. I have so many stories and things I would like to share, but I don’t know where to begin. I’d like to write about the beginning of my life, the earliest memories I have of being a child, watching my parents and siblings grow up. I’ve wanted to write about my miserable teen years and all the pain I’ve been through. But, I’m realizing it might be less than cathartic. The time I’ve spent recently reflecting on my military career has just made me more upset and sad, than relieved.
It’s hard to explain to anyone who hasn’t experienced this yet. But when I left home to join the Air Force I was really just a kid. I was a bit socially backward and the years that followed were complicated and difficult. Life lessons learned, mistakes made and paid for. I searched high and low for people to love me and understand me. I got really close, a few times, to finding what I was looking for. I’d feel the glow of adoration from someone and mistake my appreciation for love. It was a very confusing time. I immersed myself in nightlife. It’s so sparkly… And the anticipation and promise of finding affection drove my daily habits for years. I collected boyfriends for years before realizing how empty and wasteful it was.
A few too many nights of drunken drama on the side walk in front of some random party house. A few too many nights of smoking a cigarette next to the window, wrapped up in sheets in an unfamiliar apartment. The wandering is what will kill your insides. You place your future on someone unworthy, or you place it on someone who is incapable of being what you need. Those kisses just remind you of all you’re missing. You stop hoping for the best, you stop believing in human kindness, you stop seeking your true self. That lost feeling is what ruins people. It drives them to do things they never thought they’d do.
All this reflection about my life has had the side effect of melancholy. Anyone who knows me, knows that I’m the smiley type. I’m happy with where I’m at but I am not sure sometimes how to reconcile myself with who I was in the past. I can’t move forward into this new chapter without some sort of resolution. And I can’t seek resolution without delving into the mistakes I made. Apologies are ineffective. People cannot absolve me of my wrongs. I need to let go of them somehow.
I hope that this change in my life, the end of the Air Force, will start a chain reaction. I’ve left the child in myself beside the fork in the road. It needs to stay there as a symbol of discovery and release from youthful misadventures. I hope that everyone who knew me back then can see where truth found me and changed me. It wasn’t an overnight change, but it has become who I am. I’ve stopped deceiving people about my feelings. It’s all out there now. The double life that I lived as a child and as an adult, the driving force behind my low self esteem, that feeling of not being good enough, but wanting to fake like I was. Being afraid to be who I was, was what made me a unhappy fool. There is nothing to be afraid of anymore.
I hope that my life and the things that I do will be successful despite my own failings. I hope that the end of this military career has brought me to the point where I can move on in this life and the new world that I will be experiencing. I wonder if things will look different to me. And finally, will I be able to breathe that sigh of release and appreciate my freedom?
It’s hard to explain to anyone who hasn’t experienced this yet. But when I left home to join the Air Force I was really just a kid. I was a bit socially backward and the years that followed were complicated and difficult. Life lessons learned, mistakes made and paid for. I searched high and low for people to love me and understand me. I got really close, a few times, to finding what I was looking for. I’d feel the glow of adoration from someone and mistake my appreciation for love. It was a very confusing time. I immersed myself in nightlife. It’s so sparkly… And the anticipation and promise of finding affection drove my daily habits for years. I collected boyfriends for years before realizing how empty and wasteful it was.
A few too many nights of drunken drama on the side walk in front of some random party house. A few too many nights of smoking a cigarette next to the window, wrapped up in sheets in an unfamiliar apartment. The wandering is what will kill your insides. You place your future on someone unworthy, or you place it on someone who is incapable of being what you need. Those kisses just remind you of all you’re missing. You stop hoping for the best, you stop believing in human kindness, you stop seeking your true self. That lost feeling is what ruins people. It drives them to do things they never thought they’d do.
All this reflection about my life has had the side effect of melancholy. Anyone who knows me, knows that I’m the smiley type. I’m happy with where I’m at but I am not sure sometimes how to reconcile myself with who I was in the past. I can’t move forward into this new chapter without some sort of resolution. And I can’t seek resolution without delving into the mistakes I made. Apologies are ineffective. People cannot absolve me of my wrongs. I need to let go of them somehow.
I hope that this change in my life, the end of the Air Force, will start a chain reaction. I’ve left the child in myself beside the fork in the road. It needs to stay there as a symbol of discovery and release from youthful misadventures. I hope that everyone who knew me back then can see where truth found me and changed me. It wasn’t an overnight change, but it has become who I am. I’ve stopped deceiving people about my feelings. It’s all out there now. The double life that I lived as a child and as an adult, the driving force behind my low self esteem, that feeling of not being good enough, but wanting to fake like I was. Being afraid to be who I was, was what made me a unhappy fool. There is nothing to be afraid of anymore.
I hope that my life and the things that I do will be successful despite my own failings. I hope that the end of this military career has brought me to the point where I can move on in this life and the new world that I will be experiencing. I wonder if things will look different to me. And finally, will I be able to breathe that sigh of release and appreciate my freedom?
posted by saucybritches at
9/21/2005 04:27:00 PM
5 Comments:
erin, you've changed, i've seen, my family has seen it. you're a different woman than you were in high school. as long as you have changed, you have to try and move on and live the life you want to live. it just takes time, it gets easier every day as your past moves further and further into the past. don't expect things to change all at once, just be happy that your life is different now and wait for time to heal you.:)
You are an amazing writer, and have a profound ability to say what needs to be said.
I wish I could do that...
Love mom
Freedom is a terrifying concept when one has lived their life in so regimented a way for so long a time: and this regimentation, this order, can be self-imposed or otherwise. Change is frightening, make no mistake about it, but sometimes we find that our apprehension of it never quite fits how bad we thought something was going to be. I would have you think of hope and progress, two things that will benefit you greatly.
The Air Force doesn't need you, but the rest of us do.
Erin, I love you. You made me cry, it's so great that you can reach in, pull this stuff out, and put it out in the open. I admire you so much, I learn a lot from you. *hugs*
*blushes* thanks guys...
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