I'm a free radical and I love making chemistry happen in my life. I love new places and people. I live to get out there and see, touch, taste and know the world I am in. Some of my best moments are ones when things just come together, a party where I introduce and old friend to a new one or the moment a group of strangers are laughing and letting down their guard.
I am not afraid to put myself out there, like right here. I wouldn't say I think I am super interesting or important, its the fact that I believe I am insignificant that keeps me fearless.
The world, will go on. My problems won't stop it. Life is for living and sharing. I share here.
When I left my home and my family I was no more than a girl in the company of strangers.
I'm a free radical, the early years:
I remember thinking the world was cruel. When your world is made up of some not-so-forgiving grade school girls you can feel that way. I saw nothing beyond the schoolyard and I as certain life was hard. But my family brought a never ending source of characters into my life and taught me the art of extroversion. Had it not been for them and that lesson, I may not have ever been Mary.
Schoolyards change. They expand and with epiphany I found myself in uncomfortable situations learning to handle myself. This is essential to a free radical. Knowing what you must have with you to survive. The basics you can get by with. How to settle in where you are, where ever it may be.
Getting Out There: Part I, What I Want.
I want to feel free, like where I am is totally my choice and each experience is what I am there for. This is not a difficult thing, and where I am now its a great sense of motivation. I want to do what I do for a purpose. There is so little time and so much that really isn't necessary.
Part II, For Want Of.
To be honest and brief, not everyone walks away and finds the road behind them changed. My life has been a brisk walk down a path that quickly disappears behind me. There is no going back and no road home. I get out there for want of finding where I started at some ending. I am not running from home but running to it. I know, actually, it is where I am - but there are surroundings more perfect than others.
Magnets
There have always been places I prefer to others, magnets. My poles. Syracuse is the center of my little universe, I haven't lived there in ten years. In that time I have made my life along the thruway and beyond.
I can walk away from my magnets. I have and can. The strongest pull in my life is my family. Yet, my friends may not even know how much I miss them when I go, as far as magnets go their force is undeniable.
It comes down to love. The people I love draw me to here and there. Where they are I feel at home. I cannot have everyone in one place... Magnets repel as they attract. Its just a balance.
Holmesickness; (n). The pain associated with being part of my amazing family and realizing you can not be part of each others' lives the way you naturally want to.
Missing Pieces, we are like the Monopoly board, decks of cards and hand me down games we grew up with, we are missing pieces. And we substitute them with what we can find and play on. Game on.
My current game of Life is eclectic and I wouldn't change the pieces I've collected for anything.
My Home:
What if after all this time I found a new magnet? A new place. What if I made my own life somewhere and for the first time the road is right where it was when I ran down it? A place I can see my future in more clearly than the cloud I've always associated with tomorrow? Future, not just the sentiment of where I came from. What happens to a free radical when for the first time they want to go backwards?
Reversing chemical reactions.
It can happen. It might take far more energy than the original equation but it can be done.
Plain Language Box:
I didn't know when I left D.C. I would miss it. It was an accident. I swear. I went there to go there, to get away, to move forward. I never went intending to stay. I was an accident, I swear.
I left to come "home." I figured I would be fine, I always am. I was the only kid at summer camp completely not homesick. I came back to NY because I thought it was time to move on. Ask Meg, she knows, I just thought I was being silly in D.C. I thought I was hiding, killing time and having a wonderful time doing that. It was like a sabbatical.
I moved back to NY to get back on "track."
That wonderful time I was having, I see now, was my life. It was the jogs on the Mall, crepes at Eastern Market, Volunteering around town, The Amnesty Office, and the people, the ever-loving people! It was the Physchotropic Film Society, the DCDefenestrators and Fringers. It was long late runs in Maryland and the people, the ever-loving people.
And no, I didn't see it while I was there. I knew I was having fun and I knew I was happy - I was well aware I was happy. But I didn't feel like I should stay. That feeling, that truth cost me one move to upstate NY.
Figuring out you have somewhere you belong is a priceless realization. I may not make it back there. But knowing that potential exists, that I can have some amazing life in the right conditions is incredible energy for a free radical.
Happy Accidents:
That realization, that I miss D.C. was not all bad. I know now I needed to leave to focus on school just as much as I know now I should probably go back.
Go back,
To the place I woke up and started life over.
The reaction will progress at the proper rate until completion - maybe even to the point where the bond formed, can't be broken.
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