12:46 a.m. - Monday, Aug. 23, 2010
12 of 30
The application process is hard because I am forced to relive the past. Which I have tried so hard to erase from my memory. And it all comes flooding back. I just visited all of my prior college's websites to download transcript request forms. It's not just the failure that comes back to me . . .but the events that helped cultivate the failure. The first taste of complete withdrawal and isolation at Ramapo. The desperation of St. E's. The drive over the Tappan Zee in my escape to Canada. The drive home. Covering up the slices on my arm at GCC. And hiding in the student lounge at Rowan, doing so well at first . . .only to end up like a scene right out of some movie where the character pretends to go to work, but is actually hiding in a park somewhere.
And there's fear. Fear that these failures could still hold me back. I'm counting on this too much . . .what if I don't get in? And what if I do? Fear that I'll actually get in and have to change my life. Give up the comfort and familiarity of the bank. Fear that I'll fail in the program. Fear of sinking back into isolation. That's the biggest one, I think.
I love it here. I love this place. I love these people I've gotten to know. No, I'm not really close to them. I know we're just passing. A short time in a much longer lifetime. But you don't understand. You don't know how bad it was. It was so, so, so bad. I couldn't leave my room. I couldn't speak. I spent nights just dialing the suicide hotline and hanging up. Cutting my skin open and praying that one of these one-night stands would be a psycho-maniac killer that would put me out of my misery. And I could not get out.
So this life is beautiful to me. These people who come and go . . .they are precious to me. And it scares me to death to leave them. To start over in a new place and risk going back to that isolation. I know if I ever go back to the way I was then, I will not survive this time.
I see now that everything is unfolding as it should. If I had succeeded at any one of those schools, I would never have found Moravian. If I hadn't found Moravian, I wouldn't have felt this profound connection to a time and place and purpose. If I had been able to become certified to teach at Moravian like I originally intended, I couldn't apply for this program now. And this program will allow me to get a master's degree and a teaching certificate - while being paid to do so.
It scares me that I'm excited about this. Because The Bhagavad Gita, the Dhammapada, the Tao Te Ching, the Bible, the Koran . . .they all say the same thing. Don't get attached to earthly prizes. Selfish attachment brings suffering. I don't want to suffer anymore.
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