Listening to the new Switchfoot album. I'm having strange flashbacks to the last time I did this.
Senior year of high school I found myself up far too late because just as I wearily let my head rest, a sudden thought found me blindly scrambling for my glasses: Jazz band theory homework.
Life wasn't good. I was in the musical. I was in cross country. I was in a night class for college. I was taking physics. I had a full 12 hours of college classes with my high school classes. My mom was flipping out over college and my 'stupid' yet 'brilliant' mind's inability to get enough scholarships, and took it out on me. I was an introvert for pure necessity. Because I had weeks on end in which I felt the way I do now- yet I would escape to my room and finally become myself. I could let it all out, whether that was pain or exhilaration at having shaken the pain off.
And it just so happened that I noticed Hello Hurricane was streaming on last.fm or some other such site before its release date.
My solution?
I listened to the entire album repeatedly, desperately trying to comprehend the music theory homework, constantly getting lost in drawing elaborate sketches in a not too bad style of a heart mended with boards and a faceless person declaring Hello Hurricane, You Can't Silence My Love. The sketch was on the back of my homework and I even dared write "How can I possibly concentrate on homework on music when there is new music to listen to?!" Which for me was brash.
As I recall, I, nor anyone else, got a good grade on that assignment. But I still have that picture. And I still remember the lighting in my shabby room as I sat on my horse comforter and danced while sketching on my homework.
Being yelled at, being under pressure, being nearly friendless, being imperfect perfection was my life. My life was pressure, and I let out the steam in absurdly whimsical fashion. I still do. Yet when it's not a constant the presence of it prolonged just... makes me remember how dark things were. Makes me wonder where the strength went.
Yet I suppose that elasticity is a strength. I recover from my lapses. Working constantly throughout the day does not help, yet I do recover. Though is it a cover up for the stress, or is it my soul winning? That I do not know.
I'm a peculiarly joyful, whimsical person. I strive to make others smile. My eyes are always on the starlight and breeze that caresses me. Yet I'm only that way because when one is as far down as they can manage, when you look away from yourself the only place to look is up. It's impossible to see how bright life is if you're not seeing it from a dark angle...
Today as my weight fell in the theater, as I rolled my windows down and loudly sang along to music, opted to take the long way home, and smelled the gorgeous nature around me... I rather realized that the strange oscillation of dark and light, the self medication of music and nature and God, the lack of people... it made me who I am.
Certainly I knew this. I know this. Yet I didn't quite realize what a cycle it was. Nor quite the strength it takes. and the weakness. I do care too much, but I care too much because the whimsy explores and carries the hurt with it.
Regardless, as I sit here, at the end of a long day, typing instead of sleeping just as I used to, listening to a new Switchfoot album much in the same style as I did that night 7.5 years ago... I find it astounding that one does not get any better at getting hurt.
Though I suppose I spent too long being an unfeeling rock now didn't I?
Perhaps I shouldn't be surprised when the cracks reveal a geode.
