The art of departure

I typically approach the end of the new year with a mixture of conflicting feelings. Much of it is excitement, anticipation for the holiday season, giddy to cosy up by a fire under a puddle of blankets, soft Christmas music drifting from the speakers, a book in one hand and a mug of hot chocolate in the other, the pages only lit up from the flames in the fireplace and the twinkling lights of the trees. I can already feel my face growing warm with the heat of the fire as I sink further into the sofa, and it’s almost a stifling fever, but I’m reminded of how lucky I am when I hear the howling winter winds raking against the window, whistling between the trees, somehow still resounding despite the natural muting of the snow. And in moments like these, I wish I had a pause button, and though I am in no rush, I rub a lamp, and every wish is an extra second I have to revel in a memory, a reminder of the fortune I have in my life. 

The excitement is not isolated, however, as are most of the emotions that I feel at any given moment. It is tangential to nostalgia, a feeling competing with the consistency of the days in a week or months in a year. I do not seem to know how to go about live without it. It is there with every turning of the month, with every start of a season, with every birthday, and of course, every new year. As December nears, I am wracked with nostalgia for celebrations as a little girl, the Friday before break in grade school, where classes and homework became non-existent, and the only thing we knew as children were sugar cookies and The Polar Express. I close my eyes and can almost feel the pulsing of the warm, colorful lights that are strung up in the town center, the colors much brighter and, in a way, much more balmy than the ones that I drive by today. Everything I remember from my childhood during the Christmas season is surrounded by a pleasant glow, most definitely tainted by a personal bias, and though I am not ignorant enough to ignore it, I still choose to walk the path of innocent bliss. 

The same way a grapefruit is sweet and tangy at first bite, but leaves a bitter aftertaste that lingers in your back molars long after you’ve swallowed, the excitement and nostalgia are threaded with apprehension, with dread at the thought of having to start all over again. Any other day of the year, my mind can comprehend the nuance of the day restarting at midnight, the Sunday night leading into a Monday morning, but as soon as the calendars strike December, there is a nervous edge in everything I do, as if after the next thirty-one days, the slate is wiped clean, and all the hard work I’ve put in the past 365 days will become absent. There is a devil on my shoulder whispering in my ear that all the books I’ve read this year will be meaningless come January, all the miles I have logged will be futile, and everything I have written, my heart and soul I’ve poured into the pages, will become obsolete. And then what? I am left with nothing; a cavern in my chest, and the light behind my eyes is drowned out by the ball dropping and fireworks in the city. Every year, I am riddled with the fear that once December is over, all that I have worked for will be reset, and I am Atlas once again, back at the bottom of the hill. 

It’s very silly of me to think this way, I know. I understand that the passing of time is very much real, but the days, the months, and the years are all social constructs for us to have more control over something that can not be tied down or commanded. I do know that what I dread is not the reality, that the turning of a new leaf does not mean you will have nothing to show for all your hard work from the last twelve months. If that were true, I would still be walking around as a hollow shell of myself, not having known how to process grief, not knowing how to endure through the pain, through the heartbreaks, and the listlessness, not knowing that the misery I feel now will pass, as all things do, as all things will. I have become the woman I am today because the new year doesn’t mean a fresh start, but rather a milestone marking every mistake I’ve made, every lesson I’ve learned, every friend I’ve laughed with, everyone I’ve loved, and everyone I’ve lost. 

I try to remind myself that January is just another month, the same way that Thursday is just another day of the week, and 5:00 PM is just another hour in the day. I tell myself that these are ways to delineate my memories, that every January may feel new and shiny, but that is all it needs to be for me. Should I not be more fearful of April, when I last realized that I had begun falling in love again? Should I not be more fearful of June, the last time I had my heart truly broken? Should I not be fearful of August, when the sweltering heat was more suffocating with each step I took outside, or February, when the below-freezing winds made me contemplate the meaning of my existence on a morning run? The fear I have for January is unfounded, only bolstered by the social pressures of goals and resolutions, of hibernating solely with the intention of becoming your better self for the spring and summer months. Why must we burden our months with such reverence? Why can’t a month just be a month? Why can’t January just be January? 

I knock on my ribs, and the echo sounds hollow. But I know it’s a trick playing on my consciousness, the way you knock on Russian nesting dolls and the wood reverberates as if there is nothing inside when actually, each layer reveals something different and something new. If you unzip me today, you will find a version of me from this past February, still a little lost in life but happy with where she is, striving towards an end goal that won’t come to fruition. You will find a version of me from June, proud of what she has accomplished, but accepting the fact that where she is right now is where she is supposed to be. Keep unveiling, and you will find a version of me learning how to love reading again, a version of me dusting off her passion for writing, a version of me crying herself to sleep in a bedroom she does not call home anymore, a version of me chasing her sister on a bike around the cul-de-sac, a version of me falling asleep in a calculus classroom, a version of me from every lifetime, from every January.

I keep these dolls swaddled away inside of me, not hidden, but not on display for the world to see. I am content knowing they are in the confines of my organs, taking refuge between my lungs and my heart. I tuck them behind my ears and on the backs of my knees. They sing along my spine and on the soles of my feet. And on the days when I forget they exist, when I forget who I was, on cold winter days in December or the beginnings of January, all I need to do is dance it out, trace my fingers along my wrists and the nape of my neck, and I begin to remember. I hear them jingle around, like each nesting doll is knocking on the next one bigger, and it’s a reminder of it all. A reminder of the life I have lived, of the life I will continue to live.