And I'll keep saying,
"how lucky we are."
- Meiko, How Lucky We Are
-+-
"Christa, how do you find the time to be so nice and so perfect?"
"We were talking about people with positive attitudes, and I said, 'Christa...'"
"Christa, you're really popular."
"I have made it a personal challenge to find someone at this campus that Christa does not know, because she knows everyone at this school."
"My goal is to be as good as you at research, Christa."
Each time, I have to do a double-take. I fill with disbelief to the point of slow motion. On the exterior, I try my hardest to appear to accept the compliment wholeheartedly and without hesitation. On the inside, there are bells ringing and a chorus playing. On the inside, I am crying with joy. On the inside, I'll never really believe it. You're talking about... me? What?
I flashback to the time I sat in Phuc's car, crying in his arms because I was so nervous, anxious, and afraid of hanging out with his friends. I spent the entire party with my hair covering my face, trying my best to stay out of attention's way, trying my best to evade conversation with anyone other than Phuc. Soon afterwards, I relapsed into depression, because it was so difficult to endure that evening that it broke my heart.
Damn, son. How far we've come.
-+-
In the lab, everything is business as usual. I have my daily laughs with my lab tech, I engage in small talk with the graduate students, I overview the day's work with my post-doc, and I work experiments from morning until the sun is just past the horizon. The only real difference is that I've gained awareness of the fact that I walk around the lab with my hands grasped behind my back and I wonder, "…how long have I been walking like this? Do I always walk around the lab like this?"
Outside of the lab, it's very different. The town feels empty, with nearly everyone back at their respective hometowns.
It's an interesting experience for me, because over time, I've become very accustomed to the beat of maximizing my social impact. For the first time in months, there's no one to visit in the library, there's no one to buy little thoughtful presents for, there's no one to take out to lunch, and there's no one that I feel inclined to impress (outside of proficiency in research techniques, of course!). I'm used to moving at high speeds to prevent my friendships from falling into transience. I always feel driven to reinforce my presence -- I always feel like I can't let myself fall into "out of sight, out of mind." These friendships are genuinely truly rewarding and these personalities are extremely enriching to my life, but admittedly, part of it was driven by fear.
For such a bleeding optimist, I can be rather pessimistic. For instance, I'm persistently afraid of going back to that place, where I was surrounded by people, but was so heartbreakingly alone. I need to make strong, lasting impressions, or else I feel threatened. I need to be impactful, or else I feel like loneliness and depression are chasing me, eager to restore my former captivity.
But for once, that's a battle that I don't need to fight. It's a formula that I don't need to solve.
Because I left my house this morning with an amazing revelation. I looked up and down the street, and the houses all seemed so empty with all of the other students gone home for winter break. At that moment, I realized that even at the moments that I'm completely alone, I don't feel a drop of loneliness.
My improvements since The Break have a reputation for sneaking up on me by surprise. They never happen in gradients, where I feel a little better, then a little better, until I'm completely scar-free. They always happen in mutiny, in sudden uprisings; they always stay hidden in the depths of my heart, eager for glorious rebellion against my doubts and my fears.
I immediately felt capable of stopping and not only smelling the roses, but taking the time to delicately trim them of their thorns so that I can offer them in a fragrant bouquet. A restless race to the bus stop turned into a morning where I took a pause to feel the textures of frost on my car window, and closed my eyes to appreciate the crystal lattice structures that created such intricate grooves and ridges. For that moment, there was no worrying about social cues, about manners of the heart, about the success of my experiments, or about the many expectations that are on my shoulders. For that moment, there was no battle, and there was no formula.
As I breathed in the crisp morning air of Merced and watched the sun peek through the overcast, I found a shard of my heart. I picked it up, and I returned it to its rightful place:
on my sleeve.