The Past in Present

I experienced some strange sensations today.

There's a supermarket near my house. Since it's so close to where I live, a lot of people I knew from high school frequent the place. These are people I haven't talked to in years, or people I just don't want to talk to for various reasons. Yet for whatever reason, sometimes I do end up chatting, or sometimes I feign ignorance and don't say a word.

I thought about something. I knew I was actually friends and then eventually Facebook friends with these people at some point. Then I remember...I haven't seen or heard a thing from this person in ages. Turns out they've unfriended me. They've cast me aside in their life. I wondered why for a fleeting moment, because things were so good at one point. Things change so fast.

I walked around with the same scowl as I did back then. It's a stoic look. A defense mechanism against people who, at some point, could take advantage of me. This look and attitude said no more. I had no idea where it came from. I haven't been like that in years. It just kind of...happened.

I had no intention of talking to this person I really liked at one point. He was a good guy. Someone who really helped in getting a school business off the ground, gaining massive profits for the entire class. Someone I talked to in orchestra because he was a gamer like me. Things changed so much that I just didn't talk to him. He didn't acknowledge me either. It's like we never knew each other.

I may be in broadcasting, but as a part of my degree, I had to learn and write about communication theory—the science and paradigms behind why we communicate with each other the way we do. I discovered almost doomsday-centric research studies predicting we're headed for a social meltdown. We won't be able to express each other because of the way we communicate now.

I know people come and go. I've seen people I've talked to for ages on other social media avenues just outright leave, never to speak with me ever again. It's sad. We just change so much, and then don't express ourselves to each other the way we did in the past. The present just feels awkward and disjointed. I don't feel like I have many sincere relationships anymore.

Even when I do catch up with someone who may have known me, and things may have been good then, sometimes I forget who they are entirely. I just speak for the sake of speaking. I tell them what I've been up to. I can tell they don't care. They're only talking to me because it's happenstance. It's not sincere. It's merely formality.

I have a friend that is now working in Missouri. At one point, he told me he was unsure about that journey. I almost wondered how awesome it must be to completely start over. It must be amazing to meet new people and forge actual, sincere relationships that aren't awkward or disjointed. There wouldn't be a past holding you back. There would be a present to keep you moving.

I feel uninspired and unchallenged. I find myself needing a restart button. College was a good start, but a new job or a move is next. I need an atmosphere that inspires me...a view out my window that says I live here. This is my place in the world.

I want a new beginning. I want a present I can be proud of without a past I'm not proud of holding me back.