Responsibility

I woke up this morning and realized that even after a year everything is still the same. This summer doesn’t seem to be taking off in any different direction than the previous two and it’s terrifying. It’s time to leave. If I could at this very moment, I would have everything thrown into a bag, and I would be gone without any goodbyes. I would just take off and disappear. Leave behind everything, including the cell phone, and completely start my life over. Yet what is stopping me? What is holding me back? Responsibility. I was raised not to do anything too irrational. I was raised to make sure I do everything properly and then life will be easier, everything will come to me as it should. This sense of responsibility is so ingrained into my personality that I feel guilty for having spare time.

 I remember sitting on the edge of my bed in a state of unrest, crying until I thought I could cry no more, thinking, “Today I am going to end it all. Oh wait, I have to work tomorrow and I can’t leave them in the lurch. Also that would be such an inconvenience for my roommates to have to find another roommate at such short notice. That would just be irresponsible.”

This place has put me in such a state depression. And maybe I’m just on some high horse, and I have been told it is all about the attitude. I try. I honest to God try to be happy here. Yet it’s hard to be happy in a place where it’s not okay to be gay, and with the gay community that seems to think my standards are prudish. Promiscuity, open relationships, and extreme flamboyance may work for some. I seem to have a more traditional sense about relationships and more reserved view about sexuality. Being gay doesn’t make me any different than anyone else.

The smile that is often times shown is just the shallow customer service smile that I have been trained to put on for the last two years when I feel like reaching across the counter and punching someone in the face. “Remember, the customer isn’t mad at you, they’re just mad.”

So until further notice this is where I am: working on being happy, trying to find a responsible way of leaving Pocatello, even if it involves transferring colleges (after all to me education is very important). I wake up every morning, and pull myself together. I stand in front of the world and put on that smile I know too well and say with in a cheerful tone, “Hi, welcome to Luis’s Personal Hell, how can I help you today?”

One year

One year. This month marks the one year anniversary of the most life changing experience I have encountered so far in the 21 years of my existence. Over the past couple of weeks I’ve found myself rereading through a notebook I began last summer as I dealt with the emotional crisis that crippled me. My life stopped. The memories still hurt, and occasionally a phantom pain finds its way back into my chest as I reread these pages which were witness to my deepest torment. I never could understand how a person could fall apart in that way, but it takes firsthand experience to truly understand how the loss of love can affect a person.

 I never really talk about this. Some were there and watched, while others just hear bits and pieces. There are two people I’ve have told the whole story too. Interesting, one of the most significant moments in my life, and I don’t really discuss it in detail.

It’s odd now for me to think that he was capable of causing me so much torment. There were times when I would awake in the middle of the night, stand outside his bedroom door (I had my own room by this point), and wonder why I was on the outside. I would stand for hours in the late night staring at the window, watching the few cars that drove outside, and contemplate just running out in front of one. I moved out soon after.  I couldn’t understand how someone I loved so much seemed to be able to just stop loving me. I was jealous of this ability and wanted so much to do the same. I wanted to stop loving. Stop feeling. Stop any emotion that was connected to this man.

One year. God, it seems so long ago. One year since I moved out, one year since my world completely fell apart. One year. And now what? What lies ahead?

 Walking home today, I saw a person in front of me that looked so much like Von from behind that a secret fantasy of him coming back to find me and say “I love you, I never should have left you” began to play out in my mind. It almost seemed plausible and I speeded up my pace just to see his face because I was for a moment, so sure.

A part of me left with him to Boston, but I am glad that I am here. Sometimes when the sun is setting I sit out on my front porch and reminisce about the past, or dream about what might have been.

And sometimes, just for a moment, I feel him hold my hand, which makes me smile.