floating away

November 17th, 2022

The cold is here, and it will stay for a while. It’s dark by 4PM and the forecast for tonight is snow, for the first time this season. I’m writing this entry from my bed, listening to my boyfriend compose a song from the other side of the wall; waiting for the snow to fall. I have to sleep soon, it’s almost 10PM and I need to work tomorrow, and I hope to wake up to frosty-white streets and trees.

I don’t have any particular events to note down. I’ve been quite introspective; more thinking, less acting. But then again, none of these thoughts are worth writing about either. I’m mostly just tired, waiting to quit my job next year, after most of my paid vacation will have been used.

The problems at work frustrate me to a different degree. We’re a big, famous, company and I find it unfathomable how this business model has survived for so long. I’ve come to learn that what makes a company is its people. If a good, dedicated employee leaves, the changes are felt, and a part of the company’s culture leaves with them.

But I don’t feel like writing about work again. Even my most honest choice of topic, love, hasn’t interested me lately. My relationship is doing good, still healing from the summer, though the long, freezing nights catalyze the process. My newly found wish to have a crush has also been quite unstimulating, it’s mostly fantasies, nothing concrete.

The cold seasons are enjoyable for me, I feel more at peace in the quiet snow than in the scalding hot days of July and August, so I have that to look forward to. The holidays are also approaching, but somehow they only seem to remind me of the pain I cause my mother by not being there with her. I’m exhausted, and quite honestly, a bit hungry.

I’m afraid I might be depositing a lot of my boredom and adriftness on food. I was never one to eat a lot, but recently, I’ve found a new hunger inside of me. I hope it goes away soon and I’m back to not feeling hungry all the time.

Soon after the holidays, my birthday arrives and another year of my 20s will have passed. I’m rethinking my goals and ambitions. Trying to combine the realistic with the dream. What I want and what I'm afraid of, or what I think I should do and what I definitely don’t want to do. It’s all a big portion of scrambled eggs on a toast-less plate. There it is, food again.

In about three months from now, it will still be dark and cold, and I’ll be older, and a new year will have started. I’ll be different, but the same. Hopefully less tired. I have a trip planned to go back home in February, and my boyfriend will come and meet my family for the first time.

We’re still planning but the dates are set, and the tickets are bought, there’s no turning back. I’ve met his family multiple times, but I remember distinctly something clicking in my head after the first time I met them. I suddenly understood why my boyfriend is the way he is and acts the way he does - and I can’t wait for him to have this same experience as I did, next year.

When we come back, it’ll almost be spring, and a new set of issues will come with the warm days. The unavoidable will to break free that my boyfriend usually has this time of year will most likely come back, but that's a problem for the future. For now, I'll wait for the snowflakes to crash on my window.

- Ms. Rodwell