#afterfinals

More than metaphor, here is an actual story:

The semester was an implosion. By far the worst graded/evaluated performance of my adult life. Horrendous, on par with my behavior immediately preceding my psychiatric ward visit. 

*Side Note: I don’t think it matters that I did poorly this semester. School is a soft “no-fail” kind of atmosphere. And although my grades tanked, I read/wrote/painted/”gee-tar’ed”/napped/danced/listened/socialized more in 3 months than I had done in a long time. The “opportunity cost”, may as well use the verbiage they teach us in fancy business school, for failing was a huge investment into my person-hood. Economic decision are made at the margin and the differential between cost-benefit was exponential. An order of magnitude different. You can only value a decision by the cost of what is lost by making that decision (the cost of losing the 2nd best, or next best, choice). In this case there was no loss. Just significant gain. But I digress.  *Return to text*

By this point in the story my behavior has become what can only be described as “volatile.” My soul was burning with that particular brand of manic-depressive discontent, of which anyone with the condition is accustomed. After failing my last final, and after very little preparation, I jumped in my car and headed to Florida. Left at noon and drove for seventeen hours straight. Burning the midnight oil, driving straight for the one place my heart dearly missed. 

Being home. Baptized and absolved. The return of the prodigal son. There is a cleansing feeling that only accompanies being away from home for too long. The absence of some absence is the greatest gift. My suffering relieved. The first sip of some cool water after 40 days in the desert. The truest, most pure moments, are not the addition of some positive in life. But only come from the negation of a negative. This has been codified in myth and proverb, psalms and fables, didactic parables and contemporary novels, but has been so lost in these post-modern times. (See, “absence of irony” for further explanation)

“I keep shouting but no one seems to hear.” -Pink Floyd (& also every artist ever)