My first quarter at Portland State University is coming to close. By the end of today I'll be done with my last final, for Conflict Resolution, and the next thing I'll be looking towards is picking up my friend Karin from the airport! Yes, I am lucky enough to have my oldest friend come across the country to see me, but more on that later.
As I sit in the Library at PSU, waiting for 11:30 AM to roll around so I can meet my friends to complete our online Conflict Resolution final, I just want to look back at my time so far here in the Pacific Northwest.
Coming out here, I really had no idea what to expect, the whole point of it was to follow my sense of adventure and seek something new. I say this, but I still had an idea of what I wanted to happen. I was thinking I would make friends fast, commuting would be a welcome reprieve from my busy schedule, I would get along well with my Aunt and Uncle all while barely spending time with them, and that I would hit up some nightclubs, going out with new people and basically living it up in a city setting. Man, it would have been so great if that had happened. My transition from east to west would have been seamless and I would have immediately been supported in my decision to come out here.
Yeah, so that didn't happen.
Once out here, I barely spoke to people other than my Aunt, Uncle and three year old cousin. I have only hung out with people on three occasions outside of school, all of which had to end before 10 PM as I needed to get back to Oregon City to get picked up by my Uncle. My time was no longer my own, as commuting dictated my life. Where I went, how far I wandered from campus, how long I can enjoy myself before I had to cram myself on the train with other swaying individuals. Feeling trapped by perimeters controlling my life that I don't remember agreeing to, I truly began just accepting my loneliness. If I never have time to get to know people, and my time isn't my own, then the easiest course of action was to just stop trying to find friends. Stop trying to be more than just a passing face on the PSU campus.
I felt unsure of myself, sad that I was alone, but all the while still glad I was experiencing something new. Each day I would vacillate between being okay with barely talking to anyone all day, and others I would be so frustrated that I would keep my head down all day and keep my mouth closed. Both extremes are unlike me. I love people, and in all honesty can barely keep my mouth shut when I sense that I have an audience who will find me amusing! All these emotions of disconnection and apathy I have learned to associate with my depression. And for a few weeks (three) I was off my medicine because I figured if no one was going to talk to me, then I didn't have to be happy, so fuck it. And honestly, I barely noticed a difference. when I stopped taking my medicine. I mean, I had that shit anyway, the fact that I have to take it. But normally, when I stop taking it, I enter a black hole and seem to only see in black and white, slow motion. This time, I think I didn't notice a difference because my reality matched my perception. I really was alone. If I died, no one would know, and I;ll have gone having made no true friends in Portland. A failure. And it's true. When I'm on campus, no one texts me to ask if I want to hangout.
No one even knows I'm here.
With all this in mind, my first quarter at Portland State doesn't end with me alone in a library writing a blog post about how shitty my life is now after I decided I should be adventurous and move to Portland. If that were the case I wouldn't even be writing this post, I would be in the Student Union Building, asleep on a couch because I have nothing better to do and no energy to even scroll though my phone's contents.
With you reading this post, I'm sure you can tell I've gotten my ass in gear and figured a way around my nineteen year old angst. And I'll tell you how: A Paradigm Shift.
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