i am drawing the story of how hard we tried

i came to the library for 2 reasons: to get the book i'm supposed to read for my 8:30 class tomorrow, and to print off the essays i'm supposed to edit for tomorrow. they don't have the book and my printing account is, alas, at zero. and i have no cash to boot. so all in all this trip was not a success. however, today was a really sunny day even if it was a little chilly. and sunsets in geneseo are always beautiful. they don't have the brilliant colors of buffalo sunsets but that's because there's less pollution (ha). the sun always sets across the valley, you can see the patches of land as they are divided by the farmers that own them. trees are budding too. it was, more or less, the quintessential vision of a college campus at dusk. and i am so not above that.

perhaps it was the song that i was listening to, but this scene made me feel quite sentimental. not for college or even for geneseo. but you know when you are looking at something, say, a place or a person and you know things are changing. that's how this sunset was for me. i only have a few more weeks of calling geneseo home and that changes my perspective of it. it's a separate entity from me now. i can't define myself by this sunset any longer because i don't live here anymore, for all intents and purposes at least.

i know this drill, i've been here before--this feeling of leaving. and i'm sure i'll feel this way many many times over. in fact i think i know this feeling so very well that i could consider it as it's own kind of space. and that makes me feel better about all the moving and rearranging we do with our lives. it makes me know that in many ways, i am my own space. all these things i feel: emotionally, spiritually, even physically (and all those other -ly's too), it's because of these things that i will always have my own space. no matter where i go or what i do i will occupy this 5 foot tall frame; all five feet of these are mine. the way i laugh, that is mine. that crooked tooth, mine. one time i was told that i smelled good, "smelled like what?" i asked. "like you do." even that is mine. and i get to take those things with me everywhere i go. some days--like this one--it's easy to find comfort in my own bones.

and i'm singing now, "and in each other's shadows we grew less and less tall and eventually our theories couldn't explain it all and i'm recording our history now on the bedroom wall and when we leave the landlord will come and paint over it all" hello both hands. i know you.