There was a decent chunk of time in my recent history that was pretty…shitty. There were good points, to be sure, but things got pretty crappy for awhile there. I was living in a suburb of a city that I didn’t remotely fit into (DC), having to pretend to be someone I wasn’t at work, and having to curtail my involvement in reenacting because it was just too uncomfortable for the time being, both physically and psychologically. My relationship with Marc, though still good, was not what it used to be, and though I was kind of okay with that, it also took a lot of the “pep” out of my life that relationships tend to being. Somewhere along the way, I lost a sense of who I was – I was spending so much time just trying to cope with existing that my sense of self slowly got buried under a mountain of other priorities.
I can honestly say that in the last two years, my life has completely changed. And though it wasn’t one single thing that brought about those changes, the instigator of most of them was a single decision: our move to Baltimore.
I do things now that I never thought would be part of my life. Not because they didn’t jive with who I wanted to be or what I wanted out of my life, but because I never thought that those moments would ever find their way to me. I was too poor, too weird, too nerdy, too awkward, to have the life that I wanted. I hang out with friends at least three times a week now. I go to bars on my own and actually enjoy myself. I have porchfront conversations that last until 1am. I get invited to things, and actually enjoy myself when I go. When I make art I feel like I have more inspiration than time, rather than the other way around. Not only does my life now look mostly like I’ve always wanted it to, but I also feel at ease in it. I don’t feel so much like my life has changed, but that it has finally arrived.
I’ve struggled throughout much of my life with feeling like I don’t fit in with my age bracket. When I was young, I always felt like the adult in a group of my peers, and now that I’m an adult, I struggle with feeling like a child when I’m around other people my age. But, slowly, that has been changing, and I feel that my life here in Baltimore has a lot to do with that. Due to a variety of factors, I have a lot more autonomy in this city than I have at really any other point in my life. That autonomy leads to me being able to make more of my own choices, which has, in turn, helped me to feel more in control of my own life, which has, in turn, helped me mature quite a bit. Sometimes those decisions aren’t the best (see my food choices sometimes), but sometimes they lead to things like me going to an art opening, then a live music show at a bar, then a neighborhood party, making new connections at all of them.
Where I’ve noticed the most change has been my social life. In DC, everyone was so busy with work or, when not working, exhausted from work, that trying to get together with people was an exercise in futility. Here, my friends are usually open to going out somewhere, or at least up for some low-key porch time, beer, and good conversation. Not only that, but Baltimore is the sort of town where you run into people you know while you’re walking down the street, and where you never quite know who you’re going to be talking to on the next stool at the bar. Baltimore has always struck me as the sort of place you come to because something in your life wasn’t quite working, and this is a good place to sort yourself out, because nobody is going to put pressure on you while you do it.
I’ve struggled throughout much of my life with feeling like I don’t fit in with my age bracket. When I was young, I always felt like the adult in a group of my peers, and now that I’m an adult, I struggle with feeling like a child when I’m around other people my age. But, slowly, that has been changing, and I feel that my life here in Baltimore has a lot to do with that. Due to a variety of factors, I have a lot more autonomy in this city than I have at really any other point in my life. That autonomy leads to me being able to make more of my own choices, which has, in turn, helped me to feel more in control of my own life, which has, in turn, helped me mature quite a bit. Sometimes those decisions aren’t the best (see my food choices sometimes), but sometimes they lead to things like me going to an art opening, then a live music show at a bar, then a neighborhood party, making new connections at all of them.
