Life's little mysteries.

A Fork in the Road

This summer, I’m living with my best friend/cousin. Not only do I love living with my cousin because she’s family, but I also love the fact that we’re truly best friends. Now, I hear people say “Oh she’s my best friend and so is he,” and yes, they are you best friends. But then you have your best best friends. You best best friends are the ones who you can tell absolutely anything to, the ones who you trust with your life, the ones who you can be completely honest with and the ones who value your opinion. K and I are considered best best friends, partners in crime, and completely equal. Since we were in diapers, K and I have been walking through life at the same stride. K was born 13 weeks after I was, we went through high school at the same pace, we’ve both experienced college, alcohol, roommates, and living on our at the same time. Every milestone I went through in my life I could count on the fact that K was going through the same thing. When it comes to the future, K and I always talked like we were going to continue down the same path. We were going to have a special dance at each other’s weddings dedicated to our friendship. Our kids were going to grow up together and be best friends just like we were.

            However, this summer things are different. K recently got a boyfriend and it’s getting serious. On top of that, K is working three jobs to make ends meet. Can I blame her for the way I’m feeling? I could. I could sit there possessively and say “You spend too much time with him,” or “You need to come home more,” but, I wont. K is a very independent person and she does what she wants. She doesn’t really think or worry about others. She’s going to see who she wants to see. If she really wants to see you, she’ll make time for it. This is the part that upsets me. I truly care and love K so much and I could never ask her to choose between boyfriend and best friend. At the same time, does it sting walking out of the house in the morning, seeing the empty spot where her car should be, and knowing that she’s over at her boyfriends? Or feeling like I can’t come home, sit cross legged on her bed, and talk to her about my life because she’s never there? Absolutely.

            I know K is happy. She deserves someone like her boyfriend in her life. He is so good to her and I can tell that this isn’t just another summer fling or just another boyfriend. She’s smitten and I am so happy for her. I’m just unhappy for myself. Here K is at this huge milestone in her life and I’m stuck behind her. It makes me feel like I’m missing something; like she’s 10 miles in front of me and not looking back. I feel as if she’s leaping and bounding over a milestone that I haven’t reached yet. I guess life is a brat like that. For 21 years, Life gave me an awesome partner in crime to walk down this path with. Life allowed K and I to match all the major milestones so we could support each other. But now, I feel as if we’ve reached this fork in the road. She’s gone one way and I so badly want to follow her but I can’t. There are things that I used to be able to relate to with K but now I can’t.

I feel like I’m transforming into a completely different person than I was a year ago and K doesn’t know that person. She thinks she does, but in all reality, she doesn’t. Me? I like this person that I’m becoming. I really really do. I want K to like her too. I’m starting to realize that life never stays the same for long. Those future plans that K and I have may or may not come true. What if Life decides to send us down different paths again? What if K gets married and I don’t? What if I have kids and K doesn’t? What if I get married and move across the country or across the globe? What if I’m meant to walk my path alone? What if my milestones come 15, 20, or even 40 years later than K’s? I can’t hold her back and I don’t want to hold her back. I’m meant to do this alone. I’m meant to continue to grow and I’m meant to meet this milestones on my time.

Currently, I’ve picked up this book called Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed. The jist of this story is that Cheryl becomes lost in herself after her mother dies, she gets a divorce, and after becoming addicted to heroin. She decides to find herself on the Pacific Crest Trail because she knows that she has to force herself in such an extreme measure. These measures included the danger of being the only woman on the trail walking alone, wildlife, and not knowing much about hiking. This book has really helped me come to terms with K and I’s life because Cheryl is going through the same internal struggles I’m having. She knows she’s changing and she knows she can’t rely on her ex husband or anyone else to find herself. This quote from this book has really struck a chord with me. 

“I realized that what I’d started when I’d spoken those words hadn’t led to my divorce but to this: to me sitting alone in Old Station, California on a picnic table beneath the magnificent sky. I didn’t feel sad or happy. I didn’t feel proud or ashamed. I only felt that in spite of all the things I’d done wrong, in getting myself here, I’d done right. Maybe I was more alone that anyone in the whole wide world. Maybe that was ok.”

K is starting to need me less and less in her life. Maybe it’s time for me to need K less and less in my life. K has other friends, she has her boyfriend, but most of all, K has her sense of independence. Maybe it’s time for me to find mine.