In my mind, the train ride to and from Penn Station to Tretorn is 10 minutes. This is great, because there are 6:10PM and 7:10PM trains home, ideal for when I get out of work at 6 or 7.

Except. Except! It takes 12 minutes, exactly, and never any less, and rarely any more. So my train always leaves Penn Station for The Suburbs at the exact moment my subway train arrives at 23rd Street, one stop before Penn Station.

I always miss that train. The first couple times I got very anxious over it. What if another train NEVER left Penn and I was stuck there? FOREVER? I tried to will the subway to move faster, which anyone who has ever lived in New York can tell you is not only useless, it’s exhausting and always seems to produce the exact opposite effect.

But maybe PACING would work! I tried pacing once but I can’t ride the subway without holding on (and you can’t efficiently pace while holding on), making that effort into the three most harrowing steps of my life.

Finally one day I was just too damn tired to care. That’s the only upside to Exhaustion that I’ve found– it literally forces you to just chill the heck out. And what that does is create an opportunity for realizations you can’t have if you’re too busy being an idiot, trying to pace on subway trains. I missed the train, and (too tired to care about missing the train) took my time walking through Penn. I found Aunt Annie’s and let myself have cinnamon pretzel sticks. I took it a step further and let myself sit down.

I relaxed. I was too tired to push against brick walls, or fret over things that I cannot control, and I’ll tell you what, I found peace that evening, in that busy Penn Station Starbucks, amidst other people who couldn’t see the forest for the trees as they ran recklessly with blind panic to catch “their” trains.

The World Didn’t End. That was my big takeaway. That and I love me some cinnamon pretzel sticks.

I have since adjusted my expectation– I don’t expect to be on the early train anymore, because reality dictates that I won’t be. I’ve stopped fighting it.

It may seem silly, or obvious, or even small, but learning this distinction is quite profound for me. Not everything is a struggle. Not everything is controllable. The World Will Not End.

Relax.

Stop and smell the pretzel sticks.

-MM.

Just Dance by Lady Gaga is the official “Jam” of senior year, for me. It is the song that kicked off the Halloween when I was Gossip Girl, right before James and I got serious. It was my last bender with The Girls, before we all entered Last Semester, which was wrought with theses and job hunts and tears.

It was the song that was on the radio one day when I was riding with Christine… Toward the end of the song, which we were chatting through, Christine suddenly stopped mid-sentence and belted out, in perfect unison with Gaga, her epic wail of “BAAA-BAAAY!”

Like, in the MIDDLE of our conversation.

It was one of the best laughs I’ve ever had. I didn’t even realize that the part existed in the song until Tine just let it rip one day. Now I sing it to myself every time I play the song, and remember that awesome day.

I have a feeling today is going to be a little rougher around than edges than normal. I just got a phone call from Renee to remind me that the choices I’m making now are going to benefit me and my sanity in the longer term.

And then Just Dance came on my iPod. And suddenly, I felt much more equipped to just let it rip and trust the universe to figure it out with me.

It’s alright, I’m alright.
Just dance– gonna be OK.
Da-da-doo-doo, just dance!
Spin that record, babe!
Da-da-doo-doo, just dance!
Gonna be OK.
D-d-d-dance! Dance! Dance!
Just dance!

-MM.

Among the things I’ve been grappling with lately is a soul-shaking bought of self-doubt. I’ve mentioned it on Missives what feels like a thousand times (I deleted most of it, or archived it in drafts, because why list all the reasons for you why I feel I’m inadequate? You can decide that for yourselves, right?).

I’ve Tweeted about it. I’ve stewed over it. I’ve grappled with it. I’ve tried to move around it. When that didn’t work, I tried to pull from it. When that didn’t work, I tried draping a doily over it and adorning it with a flower pot. Nothing. Nothing could shake it, or make it feel less impossible to circumnavigate.

My life was punctuated with this wall of self-doubt. Behind me were days that looked so full of life and vitality, where I had all this talent and opportunity and I was too naive to understand it was something to be intimidated by. Before me laid this beautiful future brimming with the most unholy of all evil sentiments– potential.

And in the middle, trapped on the punctuation mark, there I stood. Too terrified to move.

I couldn’t write, I couldn’t dream. My imagination railed restlessly against my exhaustion. Renee, with nothing but the best intentions, even asked if I was perhaps a bit depressed. I was too tired to even take offense. And she was a bit right. I was having panic attacks and waking up at 3AM each morning, unable to get back to sleep until 5AM. Do you know how awful I am on that little bit of sleep?

Ask James. He’ll tell you. If I’m not in earshot.

I reacted to this realization– that I’ve allowed my life to become stunted in its growth– the same way I always do. Digging my heels in against change, kicking and screaming. Once I tired myself out doing that I realized that this is just a Mid-Twenty-Something-Thing-I-Need-To-Go-Through.

It’s a rite of passage, a phase that (if nothing else) is providing me with a valuable opportunity to self-reflect and make a choice. Do I stay scared forever? Possibly. That’s not what’s at stake here, and that’s what I’m seeing now. Fear is just a perception of circumstances, and I think when you’re on the cusp of adulthood, getting married and making choices about your career and education and livelihood, it’s perfectly natural. Normal. Even if it seems unfamiliar or disorienting.

The choice I have to make is to move through it or stay trapped by it.

This is fear. I understand this feeling and I know it’s traits. I understand its causes and I appreciate that any move I make may not remedy it as an immediate solution.

I also understand that Fear cannot stop me. It cannot stop time. And sooner, rather than later, both time and myself need to move forward.

So I acknowledge this fear that I’m carrying with me, and I’ll do just that. I’ll carry it if I can’t drop it, until I am through this stage. And when the time comes, and I don’t need the fear to help me really dig deep and assess my choices with such scrutiny that I’ll always be sure, beyond a doubt, that I made a well-informed, well-reasoned decision… I’ll set it aside, and move on.

But I won’t forget the lessons I’m learning now. I am strong enough to get through this.

I am young, and smart, and talented, and thin, and pretty. I have everything I could ask for bent in my favor. I also have doubt. And so what? That’s still five against one.

I like those odds. So I think it’s time to stop sitting on the sidelines. I think I’ll play this hand.

-M.

I still get a little teary eyed sometimes when I talk about My Glory Days in high school or college, when “I used to be somebody.”

I don’t know when I started referring to my capabilities as a person in the past tense, but I’m doing my best to make that stop.

I was on the train into the city this morning and One Girl Revolution by Saving Jane came on. I listened to it twice, and I’ll link to it later. It reminded me of all the issues I’ve been facing as a young woman lately, balancing my dreams against everyone’s expectation of me. I feel like I’m politely asked to sit quietly, speak when spoken to… And maybe it’s just hotheaded, youth-rebellion as I make the final steps away from my childhood, but how on earth are my peers and I supposed to find our voices if we’re always attentive to not making much noise, lest we be a bother.

I remembered suddenly the mentoring program Maxine, Christine and I developed for a competition in sustainable business programs. It focused on instilling positive body images in pre-adolescent girls, and helping them recognize, own with pride and develop their own natural talents. (We lost to a beer pong table. Yes. Seriously.)

Regardless. We shouldn’t have let the program die out. The idea was brilliant, even if it was mine. And there is such an aching need for us to hug our young girls and tell them that they’re OK, that there’s enough success and popularity to go around. That they can take their claws out of one another.

Funny how a simple song can stir such a latent fire. I have to do a bit more research,which is usually how I push phases like this to the back of my mind. But I forgot how hard it is to ignore such strong drive for a cause.

Maybe I AM here to start a one-girl revolution.

-M.

James asked me two nights ago what it’ll take to get me feeling normal again. I told him, through sleepy, sad eyes, that I am tired of being tired.

I’m burnt out, and I need to rest. For an extended period of time.

I kept waiting for a sign that it was time to take action to that end (assuming patience really IS a virtue, I wanted to optimize the scheduling of my vacation).

I came into work yesterday and found this, and it’s all the Sign I need.

-M.