Volume V: The Departure of Youth
It’s been a pretty introspective past few months. In these moments, I step away from my time in the kitchen because I avoid the questions that are important for me to ask. I avoid my alone time. And for a moment there, I thought I had lost my optimism. For the first time in my life I thought, “maybe it won’t get better.” But it’s brought me to the acknowledgement that suffering is a part of life and to understand happiness is to understand sadness. One cannot go without the other nor will one ever last forever. Because if happiness was a constant, wouldn’t it become mundane? The peaks and valleys of last year’s emotional turbulence were the most difficult I’ve had in years. I felt like a teenager again because I was unable to grip onto any tangible part of my life that fulfilled me. Although there was pleasure all around me, my hopelessness got in the way of my awareness, of my gratitude, of my love for others. Conversations became background noise and my surroundings became as useless as a stage prop exclusively used as scene filler. It’s really hard for me to simply say, “I am sad.” I was sad, depressed, anxious- however you want to express it. And now, it all seems like a dream. I had experienced the blues like this before. This time though, I was older, capable of processing, and having experienced already a lifetime of moves, adventures, and people. I wasn’t prepared for my sadness. It all came from the realization that life is not stopping. That I am indeed getting older. I’m not afraid of aging, rather I’m afraid of not fully enjoying the next 50, 60, 70 years of my life. The Departure of Youth is an exploration of my collision with time
