I forgot how much these words, moaned in melancholy by Ingrid Michaelson, hit me right in the throat.
Typically it's happened at times when I question life the most: pits of depression, break ups, extreme existential moments. It's kind of like I put myself in the mood for it first, but this time it caught me by surprise.
I just woke up from a nap and am now facing my last night here in NYC.
It's not necessarily my last night, there will be many more to come after this four month hiatus.
But it is my last night in New York as a college freshman, the bright eyed and bushy tailed moments of wonderment tuning down as I take a breath and settle into adult-like skin. "Ease on down the road!" my grandma use to tell me as she coached me into a bathtub of warm water.
The water pricked my skin in an uncomfortable way before I was able to finally exhale and learn to enjoy it. Similarly, I'm wondering if it'll be sophomore or junior when I stop holding my breath.
You see I don't have a fear of getting old or something like that per say,
it's just that when you go from a kid to an adult
you also have to make the move from dreaming about things to actually doing them.
It's easy when you have excuses like still being in high school or having no money or your age to shelter you from that work.
But when those things come and go, and you wake up done being the fantasized age of 18, and are slowly yet incessantly approaching upcoming years, and life is banging on your door like "Dude, when the fuck are you going to let me in? I'm not going anywhere"---
you get a little scared.
Personally, I question whether or not I'm going to fall short of my dreams, and if I really have what it takes to make them happen.
I want to change the world instead I sleep
I want to believe in more than you and me
All that I know is I'm breathing
All I can do is keep breathing...
How long am I going to stay in the sleepy sheltered world of childhood, waiting for my ambition to somehow drive itself and avoiding the examination of my inner potential?
How long will I just keep breathing; sometimes it's all we can do, but is it the only thing I can do?
These are the kind of questions waking up on a night like this forcefully put you in the mood to answer.
They give new meaning to an old song.
And they scare the shit out of you.
