016 is slowly coming to an end and I look towards 2017 with a twinge of apprehension. Granted all years have their ups and downs, I suppose it is how you view each year as a whole that gives you an idea of how life is going. Some people have amazing years one after the other with big, happy life events. Some people have mediocre years with lots of ups and downs.
Everyone says how bad a year 2016 has been. Sometimes I’m one of those people who looks at 2016 and say yeah it sucked in some areas of my life, but for the most part my life was relatively the same. I feel no loss with all the famous people dying, that is part of life, and we move on. I’d say some of the bigger upsets are the revealing of the underbelly of America and the U.K. I was more optimistic than I should have been for American and English politics and so 2017 and beyond will be full of apprehension on the political front.
As for the rest of my life? 2016 was a year I went through a lot of personal growth and devoted some time to reflecting on my life choices. I took a trip of a life time and I’m so glad I did. It was what I needed to feel free from the constraints of life and to reflect on what I want and where I want to be. That doesn’t mean it was an easy decision, it was quite painful to make even though I decided it is time for a new direction.
This has been a year that has challenged my current friendships as well. At times, I wonder are these friendships worth the time and effort? Are they beneficial or detrimental friendships to me? It has been a year where I have seen less and less of friends as their lives float in opposite directions. Could I demand more? Of course, but what is the point if your words fall on deaf ears. Sometimes maintaining the status quo is enough.
Right now I’m filled with apprehension for the future. It isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it could be good apprehension for all the wonderful things that may appear. I will just never know exactly. I’m excited to have a change and at the same time I’m terrified I don’t belong anywhere. It is a weird feeling to describe to others. Most people I know are more established in their adult lives. They have serious partners, they are single moms, they have kids with serious partners, they are married with no kids, or married with kids. I don’t know too many people who are single like me back home. It makes me wonder how much things will change when I go back and hang out with people that I haven’t seen in a long time.
I wonder if I will feel the strings of my heart being pulled out of pity for myself that I don’t have those things yet, even though in some ways I am content with where I am in life. I wonder if the people in my life have the space for me in theirs that they once did or has that space become smaller? As you get older and the years pass by you realize people’s lives diverge from yours and that is okay. That is part of life, but it doesn’t mean we don’t feel loss for the way our friendships used to be. It doesn’t make life easier to relate to in the face of the changing lives of those around us. Sometimes its easier to let the loss be felt and not be told to those you can feel it slipping away from, as sometimes no matter what you say you know that is a relationship that will fade away.
Relationships are the pillars in our life that carry us through the good and bad years. When you realize you are becoming transient and everyone else you know is established it becomes harder to relate. I’m leaving people I have known for 2-4 years with very established lives here to go home and see people I have had longer established relationships with that I haven’t seen in 2-4 years. It is a hard pill to swallow. The apprehension of continuously starting over is hard and exciting, no matter how much it might scare me in the process of it all, it is thrilling to say the least.
I’m not a visionary so looking ahead to 2017, I see a few plane tickets, a few vacations, and then I am home with no clear picture of what I’m doing after March 2017. I’m hoping that maybe all this apprehension is because 2017 will finally be a year where some of the things I want in life will start to be planted and possibly come to unfold before me. That would be a wonderful surprise that I would definitely welcome. Until then I’m gonna keep waiting to see how 2017 unfolds. It is completely unplanned, unknown, and full of whatever impulsive decisions decide to come my way.
Apprehension for the unknown is quite the feeling and it is quite fitting for that to be the starting theme of 2017.