A Queasy December

Someone threw up on the T today.

I heard it before I saw it. First, the gag – cutting through the silence of the subway car filled with the buzz of insomnia and the dread of work shared among strangers. I peered up from my book, already feeling on edge for reading The Love Hypothesis in public (I needed a light story between all of the World War II novels, you know?). After a moment of silence passed, I glanced back down at my book. Perhaps she’s pregnant, I thought. 

As I turned to flip the page, my fingers froze to the sound of a gutural “UH” hurled across the car. “UH…UH…” Oh god, I thought, and my eyes bolted up wide in alarm to see the person hunched over and dry heaving. As the subway car cruelly crawled from Hynes to Copley, I suddenly felt the urge to start gagging too. What if we all threw up? I thought. That must be some sort of psychological phenomenon. 

Strangers standing nearby gingerly backed away, seconds before the person finally vomited across the car floor. The T stopped at Copley, and the person walked off, looking oddly content, while the rest of us stood in collective bewilderment. It was all too much for 8 o’clock on a Tuesday morning.

~

Living in the city as a full-fledged adult has been exhausting and exhilarating. I miss the comfort of the BU community, and I feel oddly naked moving through my new life – from the T to the office to my apartment to every little place in between, like the quiet moments of writing a check for rent or pulling out the hairs in my shower drain. Working a corporate job and living alone, I have an emotional EKG patterned with waves of determination and loneliness. Some days, the freedom and demands of being a young adult all feel manageable. 

But occasionally, I have my doubts. A few nights ago, I dreamt I was ascending a cliff with little chunks of ice protruding like climbing holds on a rock wall. But the ice was melting through the warmth of my hands, and I knew I’d eventually fall, no matter how hard I tried.

I woke up in my childhood bedroom, not even wanting to consider the metaphor.

I’m home in Michigan for the holidays, and the break from the city has offered unexpected breathing room to process how my life has changed since graduation. A few evenings ago, I was sitting in my room while listening to the rhythmic pattering of the rain, wondering why I was feeling lonely even as I heard the voices of my siblings from a room away. I pulled out my phone and clicked on an app called “How We Feel,” an app recommended by my old therapist that provides a selection of emotions with descriptions you can tap on to help you identify the one you’re feeling (it also allows you to journal reasons for the feeling and offers tools to help address it). 

I clicked through different emotions shaped as blue bubbles until I finally landed on lost. The description: “feeling uncomfortably alone and lacking direction.” Oddly enough, reading this made me feel lighter. Oh, I thought, isn’t that what being in your twenties is all about? 

I sometimes forget that I’m not supposed to have my life fully together, that I’m not supposed to always feel like the best version of myself, that it’s normal to feel alone when I’m a room away from my family, that it’s okay to lack direction even when I have a secure job. 

Because after all, people throw up on the T. 

It can be nauseating, having so much freedom. But I’m also grateful for it. Because freedom provides opportunity for observation and inevitable growth.

I might be self-critical and a little lonely, but also…who isn’t? This upcoming year, I want to focus on what fills the new spaces of my life rather than wallowing in the voids.

I’ve seen some interesting things in the city this year. A woman sitting on the T drawing a koi fish on a blue piece of paper. A man at a table eating a tub of ice cream and reading War & Peace. A base of a blender left on the side of the road. A car with a bumper sticker that reads “Are You Following Jesus?” A couple standing on the sidewalk untangling a necklace. A sign that says “a good sandwich is like an old friend.” And vomit, spread across the ground like an ugly rug, just waiting to be stepped on.