Weekly Reflection: Finding… Maybe?

All Final Four losses considered, this week was actually pretty good.

I talked to at least my closer friends about the separation I was feeling, and perhaps unsurprisingly it helped quite a bit. I generally maintain the position that the best way of dealing with things is to bring them out in the open, even just to the extent that articulating them fully helps you get perspective on them, but somehow I always manage to forget that when new problems arise. Regardless, things felt a lot better this week, and I’m thankful for the friends who talked to me and made it feel that way again.

Particularly, a small journey with one of those friends to the place that kicked off the person I’ve become in my new character arc helped a lot. I’d prefer to keep its exact location a secret, but if you care enough to know I’d be happy to let you know. Regardless, just the chance to return to the woods and ground myself a bit has meant a lot.

I’ve actually begun to ritualize one small area of that place, though not the one pictured above. I intend on writing a full post about that at some point, but the introduction of ritual into my life that I’ve felt a lack of in the wake of religion’s presence has actually been quite significant, spiritually and emotionally. It helps keep me grounded, and helps remind me that the pieces of my life I hold important conceptually ought to be made a routine factor, not just held as conceptually important.

On Friday night, I was also able to go to a club with a friend from the paper and one of my roommates, and that reminded me just how fun going out can be. I’m really not sure how this fits in with the whole social anxiety thing, but for some reason dancing in public spaces is one of the places I feel most comfortable. Being in Nashville was the most socially confident I’ve ever felt in my life, and this felt like that again. I looked like an asshole, wearing a maroon turtleneck and a gold chain, but for some reason I just didn’t care. I enjoyed myself, and it made me feel happy and alive. I really don’t know what to do with that information about myself, but it’s cool I guess!

Moving onto basketball, as all of these posts so far inevitably have, this week was obviously quite disappointing, but satisfying still in many ways. Villanova came up short, and obviously missed Justin Moore quite a bit in a pretty resounding defeat against an obviously better (and now champion, as of half an hour ago) Kansas team. Even still, and I’ve maintained this since before the game even started, this season has meant quite a lot to me.

In large part, I came to Villanova because of basketball. The comparison of the exactly one basketball game I went to at William & Mary, and the one I went to at Villanova over winter break my freshman year when I was first beginning to consider transferring, was simply night and day. There was no community, and no spirit, at the W&M game. Villanova’s, even as a non-student, was utterly intoxicating, and immediately I found that it was exactly that community that I was missing at W&M (I still love you always, Mr. Jakob).

After COVID robbed me of that experience in both my sophomore and junior years, though admittedly it was supplemented by the community of close friends I found here, to have had such an amazing basketball season meant the world to me. Sure, coming up short sucks. But I do feel that coming up short right at the end has some symbolic meaning to me.

There’s still more to do. I’m bad with endings, and the end of my time at Villanova will more than likely be the most painful ending I’ve yet experienced. That said, I can find some solace in the imperfection that this year has presented itself with. If this year were perfect, I might be one of those losers who remains stuck in college for the rest of their lives, and we simply cannot have that. For that reason, at least, I can take something from the loss.

The end of basketball did, for some reason, finally make it sink in that my time here is ending soon. Yes, I’ve been stressed about the impending finitude in an acute sense. Still, the genuine reality of the situation still hadn’t fully set in for me. Laying in bed at 3:00 a.m. on Saturday night, however, with my phone finally laid to rest, laptop closed and put aside, and staring in contemplation at the ceiling, it finally hit home. It’s almost over. It really, really is almost over. Obviously it was going to come sooner or later, but in some ways it just seemed like it was always so far off that I didn’t need to think about it at all except to get a job for afterwards.

Now, suddenly, the actual existential fact of the increasing finiteness with which my days at Villanova are numbered has made itself present in my day-to-day, and I think my senior friends are starting to feel it too. Kind of all of the sudden, everyone’s begun suggesting things to do left and right. This coming Friday is going to be one of the most socially packed days I’ve ever had, and it seems there’s going to be a lot of weekends like that in the coming six weeks. That’s a good thing, and I’m glad we’ve all agreed to make the most of it. I just hope everyone’s able to live in the moment for what we’ve got left, as much as is possible at least.

All this has actually led me to possibly finding something to do after graduation. Today, Yelp sent me a link to schedule an interview for a sales position. As I clicked through it, and filled out the personal information fields, I went to submit it with my selected time and just… couldn’t bring myself to hit the button to submit. Sitting through an Econ lecture I wasn’t paying attention to, I had a slight existential panic mid-class, and began searching desperately for something I could justify doing next year. Finally, after realizing working for the National Park Service proper kind of sounds like it sucks, I found something a bit different.

I found a really cool company that hires you to work in varying hospitality jobs near some really cool places, and particularly in National Parks. The best part is they often provide free or heavily subsidize housing, so even though the pay isn’t all that high my expenses would be super low, which balances things out well. It seems like it might be the right move to make for me, at least right now, and I think that regardless of anything else it’d provide me a great opportunity to clear my head for a bit, write some more, and consider what my longer term future looks like. Plus, the opportunity to live just a bit south of Yosemite, or a 20 minute drive from the Grand Canyon, is a difficult one to pass up. I think I’ll submit some applications tomorrow, we’ll see how it goes!

I hope there’s more posts like this to come. After how rough this semester has been overall, it felt really great to have a good week this week. This coming week will be busy, with a test Wednesday in my Econ (gross) class and a paper due Thursday, but hopefully I can convince myself to not be an idiot for once and just prepare adequately. We shall see, I’m sorta running out of academic steam. Regardless, I’m just thankful for this past week and am hopeful for continued better days ahead.

Song of the Week: