#astigirl

(via Learn From the Astigirl Tweet Sering)

"In U.P., I knew exactly who I was. And who I was in that school was someone I really liked and respected.

It seems fitting then that later on, as a wage earner assailed by self-doubt and annoying existential questions --- "is this what my life is about?", "What do I really,really want?" -- I would find reprieve in the place that first showed me my potential. Whenever the otherwise manageable undercurrent of indecision, confusion, and fear swelled into a great wave,  carrying me and then slamming me down on the shores of some desert island, I would be left with no other choice but to try to regain my bearings. During these times, I would pick myself up from my island of misery, skip work, and make my pilgrimage to U.P., as though to get in touch once again with the bold, uncompromising, spirited girl that I seemed to have left there.

It didn’t matter what I did during the visit: join the late Sunday afternoon crowd brisk walking, jogging, biking or skateboarding around the Academic Oval; share a slice of Devil’s Food Cake with an equally “lost and confused” U.P. alum friend or sibling (three younger sibs were undergrads at U.P., one took her master’s) at Chocolate Kiss Café; catch another wild performance by my never-say-die friend and iconic campus figure Romeo Lee; or just plant myself in one of the benches scattered around the campus like a village grouch, scowling at the carefree students who walked by and relishing my cynical old-timer mode as I mutter disdainfully, “Bagets.” The answers may not have come to me at that point, but always, during the course of my short visit, the school never failed to remind me of who I was and all I could be. The memories of my four fabulous years in U.P. would crowd around me like old, solid cheerleading friends recalling the moments in my college years where I was most proud of myself. And then the crippling doubts and fears would be replaced by an unshakeable confidence that, as that unofficial U.P. Humanities professor Bob Marley sagely sang, “Everything’s gonna be alright.” Relax lang, the vibe around me seemed to say. Aabot din tayo dyan. You already know you got it in you to make it.

And I would always trust that feeling. The strange, almost drug-induced powerful feeling that never once failed the past 18  years since I felt it.

Everything was gonna be alright.”

  By: Tweet Sering, "Finding my way, again and again..."

from:  “Astigirl: A grown up girl living on her own terms,” 2011

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