Bigger than my Body

Today after a boring biology lecture where my professor talked about cow poo(no seriously) and dragging around work which I usually do on Friday, I headed off to have a meeting with my English professor.

I rarely talk in the class though it is my favorite class. My only form of communication to my professor is through my writing, and on every paper I have written she leaves comments such as"outstanding", "Nice" "I love this thought" . I figured I must be doing something right, as I scanned other people's comment free papers.

But on our last paper she wrote a hefty comment stating that my ideas where great but as usual I was having problems with executing my thoughts. Thus my paper was convoluted and hard to decipher. But what got to me that most was "what happened this time around Ms. Beck???"

I must have stared at that comment for a few moments. What had happened? I didn't know I was in a position where she was expecting more out of me than I put in. She even shortened my name like we had been old pals, what does that mean?

I figured I should at least schedule a meeting to talk with her about the paper and how I can become a better writer. I mean figure if this whole medicine thing doesn't work out, I will take a chance on writing. I could surprise myself with what I could write.

At our meeting she said that she enjoyed my writing the best, but I think at a higher level then I am able to process. She said I have a gift in being able to pick up things in novels, but that expressing them is very hard for me. Like I had an ability to point out the very interesting concept, but I had difficulty in showing it. I wondered why I always hated show and tell in elementary school. I can show but i sure can't tell.

Basically my thoughts are way bigger than I am. And it is difficult to wrap myself around a concept I have fully yet to grasp. It's strange because that is how I feel every day. That my mind is working at a level much bigger than me. She attributed this to a sensitivity that i have which i convey through my writing. I find it interesting that she says it is a talent to have a capacity to conceptualize my thoughts and a novels deeper meaning, and yet I find it a burden. Not so much because I don't like being introspective but because it's exhausting and lonely sometimes.

All in all it was a good meeting and i learned something more about myself.

I have therapy on Wednesday and still sticking with the house theme I am suppose to draw a picture of the boxes that crowd my basement. The last time I went she wanted me to explain the interior of my house. I explained that my house was very well decorated inside, but there are three places which are sacred and no one is really invited into:The basement, my room, and the attic.

While the basement is a place in my house I dread going into because it is dark and scary and has a whole lot of boxes, my room is a place that I can be uninhibited in. It is fun and crazy and I can dance and sing as loud as I want. The attic is where I go for solace, I write and think there. To me the three rooms represent the mind(basement), body(the bedroom) and soul(attic) and because there is disconnection between the three there is a disruption in the way i view myself.

She of course was very interested in the basement and thus asked me to draw up boxes and write what is inside each of them. So far I have just been drawing boxes with things like "dad" "love" "criticism" and "regrets" marked next to them.

Regrets seem to be my biggest box right now, or at least the one taking up all the space. I fear for a 20 year old I have many regrets. But I think my fear of having regrets prevents me from taking chances. Being the one in my family who is suppose to have it all together and stay the straight and narrow path, I fear my regret is that I haven't taken a route all my own. I haven't create my own path to see how differently things could be if I just take a chance.

I think that will be the hardest box to get rid of, because it isn't a box stored with events or consequences of someone else's action; But packed, taped, and stored by me. Because even though the road that I am suppose to take seems safer and more concrete and lined with street lights, there is something magical about the other road. About my vey own road. There is an uncertainty and cloudiness that makes it intriguing. And the problem is that I can see that road from my the one I'm walking, and I can't help but wanting to change routes, just to see where it could take me.