Can We Move This Along, Please?
Nostalgia doesn't know what the hell she's talking about.
I’ve been told this is some good advice:
“Enjoy the present moment, you’re going to miss it someday.”
Ok sure, that could be true. But also, is that just nodding to future nostalgia when maybe the present moment really isn’t all that great?
I’m currently trying to fork and knife my way through this particular moment that is so overcooked there’s no possible way to eat it let alone enjoy it. I’m preparing to leave a job that my heart hasn’t been in for years while trying to remain aware that some part of me will eventually miss all the minutiae of my 9-5. I’ll miss my usual commute, the banter with the coffee cart guy outside of the York Street train stop, working in an iconic building in Dumbo, having a safe job with good benefits, even rolling my eyes at my sarcastic, know-it-all coworker. I know that someday I will miss everything about the life I’m in right now, even the things I don’t like, because that’s how nostalgia works.
Nostalgia is the rose colored retrospectacles that make the past seem way better than it was. It goes like this:
Reality: “I hate this decrepit shoebox shanty with a bullshit door that never stays shut! I can’t do this for seven more months, I’m burning everything to the ground!!!!!!!!!!!!”
Nostalgia: “Awwww remember my cute little apartment with the whimsical door that welcomed everyone?”
I’ve got something to clear up once and for all about nostalgia… *ahem*
NOSTALGIA’S INTOXICATION DOES NOT COME FROM MISSING THE PAST, IT COMES FROM THE RELIEF OF NOT BEING THERE ANYMORE.
There, I said it. And I stand by it because I’m three months into my four months’ notice at work and I’m going considerably postal. My physical self is still on the monotonous hamster wheel I’ve not given two licks about in years, while my spirit is entirely in my new life, the life I’ve been dreaming about and working towards for even longer than I’ve not cared about my day job.
I’m in the midst of a massive transition, an actual graduation you might say. I’m leaving my life as an assistant, a job I’ve stumbled my way through for ten years, to attend Columbia’s Creative Writing MFA program. I’ve never been more ready to move on. My life feels like it’s starting, my real life, not the training ground the Universe forced on me for ten years to make sure I knew how to meet a deadline and attend a meeting on time. To be fair, all of that was 100% required. Without being beaten into professionalism, I would have sounded like this:
“Deadline? Oh, there was a meeting? Ugh oh my god I’m sooooo sorryyyyyy I misssssed it againnnn… ughhhh what’s wrong with me? I was just really distracted by how blue the sky was that day. I’m an artist you know, and artists really are at the mercy of the natural world, someone’s gotta keep an eye on these things right?… HAHAHAHAHAHAAAA… oh my god but really though, I am so sorry. I swear I’ll make it next time, and I swear, 4th deadline extension’s the charm.”
With that awful visual in mind, I wholeheartedly appreciate every aspect of being whipped into shape over the last ten years. I can also confidently say that I will not actually miss it at all despite whatever my future nostalgia says. Having two conflicting feelings coexist in the same space is interesting and complex, but it’s also weird and a lot to hold. I don’t want to hold it anymore and I’ve had a lot of time to recognize that… but here I am with another six weeks ahead of me— continuing to hold it while trying to figure out how to wrap it up in a nice, pretty, airtight package without a single stone unturned. But truthfully, I’m so distracted by the burning desire to leave that I’m completely blind to any loose ends my future self will look back on, wishing I’d tied.
My future nostalgia will be saying stupid stuff like “I wish I had spent every day enjoying the perks in the office and not worked from home so much and gone to all the cool art galleries nearby and ridden the Dumbo carousel more and been more aware of the fact that I was one of New York’s bad bitch working girls with a chic corporate job that I complained about endlessly at happy hour with a bunch of other chic professionals who also hated their bosses.”
And to my future nostalgia, hear this: I’M DONE, I’VE BEEN DONE, THAT SHIT WILL FOREVER BE DONE, MOVE ON, YOU WEREN’T THERE!!!!!!
But just as I needed the ten-year training ground, maybe I also need the four-month transition for exactly this reason, to remember that the past belongs in the past.
With that… a new poem.
Thankfully, these kinds of all-consuming moments are excellent for writing new things. Here’s one that came from one of my better days of complete surrender to this never-ending holding pattern.
Schedule
I have a few especially exciting features coming up! Hope to see you at any of them, and if not, wish me luck and I’m sending love back. 💜
Saturday, July 13th | 10am - 3pm | Co-Hosting the Algonquin Stage at The New York City Poetry Festival with my good friend, Cierra Martin! | PoFest | Cierra’s Poetry show, There’s A Lot to Unpack Here
Same day | 1:30pm | Algonquin Stage | Featured Performer with Joe Maldonado’s “Bards Against Hunger”
Sunday, August 4th | 2pm| Brooklyn Music Kitchen | Inspired Word Poetry Hour featuring Sullivan Summer, Caroline Hagood, and me!
Thursday, September 12th | 7pm| Brooklyn Music Kitchen | Inspired Word’s BK Voices
Thanks for waiting with me,
Izzie