Goodbye, Perfect Year

July 28, 2016

I’ve discovered a recent fascination with maps. Waiting for the subway, I’ll trace a hand over the stops inked in black, superimposed onto brightly-colored lines, vibrant against Seoul’s topography. I can’t keep myself from slowly deciphering each name, some becoming more and more familiar as we frequent them: Konkuk University. Cheongdam. Apgujeong. Gangnam.

If I were more susceptible to clichés, I’d fancy my recent map obsession an inevitable product of the uncertainty and confusion brought on by my current stage in life; this transitional summer has not been kind. Why Veronica, I’d tell myself, obviously your subconscious has registered just how lost you feel right now and is trying to compensate.

But I hate clichés, and besides, I’m not lost. Earlier, in June, during a time I’ve dubbed The Lowest Point Of My Life, sure, I would maybe have accepted that explanation. But I wasn’t looking at maps then; I was writing poetry. You can only write poetry when you’re sad? is a question I’ve gotten more than once in response to my previous post. Actually, it’s more that I can only write poetry when I’m emotionally compromised. It is a way for me to regain some semblance of control over my life. And I like to be in control. It makes me feel safe.

I spent most of senior year aggressively in control of all I did. My planner contained every homework assignment I ever received, accompanied by hand-drawn boxes to check off once said assignment had been completed. (Although to be fair, some of those boxes never got checked off.) I acted out important conversations in my head, trying to anticipate possible outcomes so I’d be prepared. I organized hangouts with friends, picked out the next day’s outfits before bed, brainstormed driving routes in case I needed to get gas, decided the classroom I would work in depending on my free period. I’ll probably forever look back on senior year as my Perfect Year. Everything worked out, and that was because I was in control. When something went wrong, I hadn’t planned it well enough in advance. I had let impulse take over.

Then in May, my Perfect Year crumbled to an end, and I found myself at a loss.

Trust me, I tried. But everything was ending, and I didn’t know how to fix it. I graduated, and suddenly it was summer, and everyone was gone, either on vacation or employed or otherwise engaged in activities much more productive than what I was doing. And I was clutching at what was left of my Perfect Year, trying desperately to remain behind, so lost in the past that in every interaction I had, whether with family or friends, it must surely have been visible in my words, my eyes: I just want everything to go back to normal.

But Veronica, you’re thinking. What does any of this have to do with maps?

Sorry, sorry. I’ll get there.

I could pull myself out of it when I had a plan. When I knew what I was doing. So I scheduled. I organized. Some days, if arranged well enough, I might leave home in the morning and not return until ten or eleven at night. Each of these days, meticulously planned, kept me going. You need something to do, my mom was always saying. I’m doing things, I would reply. And I was. I was seeing friends, getting brunch, going on runs—but I wasn’t being productive, not really. And I was neglecting my family.

This was my big, overarching plan—formed unconsciously, yet the impetus behind every decision during that terrible month of June, when I allowed my desire for control to control everything I did: I wanted to drown myself in my own plans, so that I didn’t have time to think, to relax, even to breathe. Because those were the dangerous moments. I knew the second I loosened my grip—the second I let myself sit down for even one minute and allow my thoughts to take over—I would be overwhelmed. By what, I wasn’t sure. Confusion, maybe, or just sadness. And I was too afraid of what that might do. For so long—nearly ten months—my life had been lived on my terms, and I had been happy. The only way to get that happiness back was to be in control once more.

It didn’t work. And it also sucked. A lot.

I have a beyond terrible sense of direction. Generally, if someone asks me to point them to a certain place, they should just head off the opposite way. Once, I was trying to get from one place in Durham to another and drove four miles on the highway and ended up back at my house in Chapel Hill, not only in the wrong town but also four miles from both the place from which I had departed and the place I was trying to get to.

Yes, seriously. I’m that bad.

But in June, the verdict was unanimous. My mind was pointing me into the future—counting down the days until my friends got back from vacation, counting down until the end of July, until August, until September—and my body was urging me away from my house, from North Carolina, as far away as I could possibly get. I was, due to my aforementioned fastidious planning abilities, always leaving the house, unable to be alone for more than a couple hours. I couldn’t even read—my thoughts kept wandering. Five more days til vacation! it was saying. Then three weeks of vacation, thank God, get me out of this place, then people come home so at least I can be with them in August, then COLLEGE.

College college college, where I could start over, where I could remake my perfect life from the bottom up. Where I could be in control.

But a funny thing happened. No, two. First, I left for vacation and ended up in Korea. That perspective—a seven-thousand mile look at my house and my town and my own pathetic life—afforded me a much-craved emotional getaway. And after two weeks, I began to realize just how much I missed home. Somewhere along the way, I had achieved the closure I didn’t even know I needed; I had gotten my escape, but I wanted back in.

And I also received some very good advice: Relax a little bit. It will be okay. Don’t feel like you have to be in control.

Most of the events in my life that I list under the Stupid Things Veronica Has Done category are so named because they have been impetuous decisions. I’ve never trusted myself to follow my instincts. They usually lead to bad choices, and bad choices lead to conflict, and I hate conflict, because it makes people impulsive. You can’t plan for it. Ever tried to act out an argument in your head before actually engaging in said argument? You never know what the other person is going to say—and I hate being caught by surprise.

But a lot of the best things have also been accidents. Music. Books. Writing. All of those—unplanned. All of those—life-changing.

So why the maps? you’re still wondering, because I haven’t actually talked about them yet. I’m almost there, I swear. But first, there exists a band called the Front Bottoms, and they have a song entitled “Maps.” You should go listen to it. It doesn’t make a lot of sense at first glance, but that’s the way most Front Bottoms songs are. Keep listening, though, and you’ll quickly understand why I think they’re so brilliant.

(Or maybe you won’t. There’s a reason that only like four people in the entire world voluntarily listen to the Front Bottoms.)

The very first lines in that song: there is a map in my room on the wall of my room and I’ve got big, big plans / but I can see them slipping through almost feel them slipping through the palms of my sweaty hands.

And that’s me. No matter how many maps I put up, what good can they be if I’m not always in control?

The things that made my Perfect Year so perfect—the musical, a cappella, revamping the newspaper, history class—they were products of accidents, every one. After all, who swore sophomore year that she would never ever be on stage or sing in public, ever? Who listed history as her least favorite school subject for nearly her entire academic career? Who applied to journalism camp on a whim, not knowing just how staggeringly it would change her life?

The track meet in which I achieved my long-term goal of breaking six minutes in the mile was a no-name meet. A simple dual meet, a race for which I barely even stretched because I was so sure that I was going to run badly. And somehow I crossed that finish line in 5:58.

(I never broke six again, not at conferences, not even at states. It was just that one time.)

And so I look at these Korean subway maps, and I touch the names and the colorful lines and wonder at the people who have to travel from one end of the city to the other, what kind of a trip that might be. I pick out my destination, locate my starting point. I transfer those symbols into my memory.

But I don’t count the number of stops. I don’t ask how long it will take, how many times we’ll have to transfer lines, how much we’ll have to walk. Because the train always arrives before I have all the answers.

Instead, I get on, find somewhere to sit (or not), and people watch. Feel the station lurch away beneath my feet. Hold on tight.

I don’t look back.

Header image courtesy of Skyscrapercity.com