...moving to Chicago was, as I put it in the blog entry title, "A Dream With A Chance of Becoming Reality" and I have been living that dream for a year and a half. And what a year and a half it has been.
Honestly, when I look back at to the things I posted on Facebook, Twitter, and here or when I read diary entries from before I moved here, I do not recognize that person. I know that some of it has to do with growing up, but a huge part of it has to do with the fact that I did not feel the pressure to be the person everyone I knew thought I was.
Let me stop for a second and explain what I mean. I spent my life trying to be the person I thought everyone would want me to be. There was influence from my parents, my sister, my friends, the people from the church who had known me for most of my life, the women in my sorority, the BCMers, and literally every other person around me that I thought I had to impress. Can you imagine how much pressure that was? Seriously, just think about it for a second. I was so caught up in attempting to be someone that all of these people could accept and look to all at once. I am not saying that any of these people ever expressly said that I should be one way or another. I am saying that, through my interactions with each of these people, I assumed different layers in order to appear to be one of them. The level-headed daughter who was on the Dean's List in college. The bossy-yet-understanding sister that Ash needed. The perfect, little church girl who never missed a Sunday and went to youth, prayer, and youth prayer every week too. (Of course, that was taken on after the BKN-influenced young teen years.) The studious, philanthropic sorority girl. The Christian influence to the campus I inhabited. Get the picture?
Also, I feel compelled to note, I do not think that I am the only person to have ever dealt with anything like this. Nor do I think that I am a special case. I just know my truth. These pressures, especially piled on top of each other, were crippling for me. That is all I am trying to express.
As I grew up, some of those roles just did not quite sit right anymore. The biggest one was that I could not agree with some of the things that I saw going on, and heard being taught, in the church I had gone to for 14 years. (I am fairly certain that this is the first time that I am publicly admitting this, so I hope this isn't unsettling for a few readers.) I will not go into details; this is a completely personal matter, and I am not sure that it is even something that could be put into comprehendible words. Nevertheless, I was churchless for my first year in college. Call me cliché, whatever. I needed to find my own way around in my relationship with God, which, for me, meant letting go of everything I thought I knew and understood about God, religion, doctrine, et cetera. I was pretty radio silent with God that year too. (During class in English 101 in my first semester, a guy in my class invited me to the BCM, but I did not go until my sophomore year when a Delta Zeta invited me to go.)
Anyway, I am getting off track. Moving to Thibodaux removed the sisterly duties, for the most part, and the good, little, church girl pressure was mildly alleviated, though not completely as I still interacted with a lot of those same people on weekends and over breaks. I took on the sorority girl and BCM attendee roles sophomore year. They were not nearly as stressful as the earlier pressures, but I still was not completely happy. This had a lot to do with my need to please everyone. I hate conflict, and that will never change, but I let it get out of control. I refused to address several things during my sophomore year, specifically things that had to do with my roommates (i.e. my bff and my big sis), in hopes that I would either get used to the existence of said annoyances/issues or that they would magically disappear and all would be well. I wanted to still be a child, who did not have to deal with things. There was no being an adult, confronting the issue, and coming back from the fallout.
Alas, this did not end well. Each teeny, tiny little irk, complaint, annoyance, outright frustrating thing piled up and collapsed in ruin on my life. It cost me my best friend and my big sis. And honestly, that was just the immediate cost. I lost contact with another friend because she was friends with my best friend too, and I did not want her in the middle of my problem. There were certain sisters I felt like I couldn't interact with because they were friends with my big sis. My grand-big sis turned out to be a great source of comfort and guidance, but I am not proud of how that affected her relationship with my big sis for that period of time. Going to DZ functions meant that my big sis was there, which was all kinds of awkward. I mean, how do you make it not obvious that you aren't speaking to your big sis when you're around all your sisters? The list goes on and on. That is what forced me to make a decision between staying at Nicholls and moving to Chicago.
Chicago was a God-send. No joke. I did not know it when I wrote my first post about it two years ago, but there is no doubt about it now. My last semester at Nicholls was hell, and I spent many nights crying because I did not want to go back and deal with the fallout of losing my best friend and big sis. It got to the point that, when I went home for the weekends to work, I would have my dad pick me up as soon as I got out of class around 11 am on Fridays and have him drive me back on Monday mornings right before my first class so that I would not have to be in the apartment on Friday or Sunday night with my roommates. When I wasn't crying, I was trying to figure out where I would live in the fall because my current roommates weren't an option, and Nicholls had just implemented a new way of assigning dorms, which would have left me with a less desirable room assignment than incoming freshman. (It was stupid and complicated and confusing and no one liked it.) I had a friend offering to let me live in her father's house with her, it was so bad. I was feeling utterly defeated. I could not, no matter how many other people I had by my side, go back and run the risk of seeing people, who I used to be close to, around and having to pretend that they did not exist because we were not speaking. I would have had to be fake during encounters with my big at sorority events. (Don't even get me started on the family pics my grand-big wanted...) I would constantly be reminded of the stupidity of the fight that ruined everything because I took numerous walks around the campus to cry on the phone to my parents about the situation so my roommates wouldn't hear me cry. Being on that campus another semester, let alone another two years, would have killed me. My spirit would have been broken. So I ran. Nearly 1000 miles.
Not only was I able to escape the debilitating surroundings of small-campus Nicholls State in small-town Thibodaux, Chicago removed every pressure I had felt. (Minus the studious-need-to-get-good-grades part, which will never go away.) I knew no one, not even the girl I was moving in with. No one knew what roles I had played before I got there. I was no longer the buffer between my sister and my parents. I didn't have to be the conservative, Evangelical Christian girl who went to the BCM. I was not surrounded by my own mistakes and the friendship fallout. I could be whoever I wanted. There was no baggage. I was free to express myself, and there was no prior knowledge to be applied to me. (The only role I genuinely miss(ed) was being an active collegiate in Delta Zeta.)
Now, I know that I could have done this without moving to Chicago. It would have been about a million times harder, but it could have happened. I could have decided to say, "Screw everyone's ideas of me, I am going to chose to not hide my true feelings." Remember when I said I don't like conflict and always want to please everyone?? Yeah, well, how do you think that would have gone over? I cannot stand letting someone down, no matter what. It's physically painful for me to think that I have not lived up to whatever someone has thought me to be. Changing into something other than what people, who had known me for practically all of my life, can we say crushing? I have a lack of self-confidence. It was so much easier to change into the person I wanted to be 1000 miles away from the judging eyes.
Since moving here, I have decided on a church to attend for myself. I am surrounded by like-minded people there, and I feel free of obligations to be certain way. I have reengaged with Delta Zeta by joining the Chicago Area Alumnae. I miss my chapter, and I will always regret missing out on many of the things that come with being an active member in college. But these women remind me why I chose a sorority and why I chose Delta Zeta. My friends...honestly, I do not know what to say. We are from vastly different backgrounds, but I would not trade them for anything.
Even now, I can see myself being vague and skirting around some huge ways I have changed. With all the ways I have changed into a vastly different person in the past year and a half, I still cannot cope with the idea that people, who I used to be close to but maybe aren't so much anymore, thinking differently of me. I don't know how to get over that, but I suppose I still have time to work that out.
But this is why I don't want to come back. I know it would be easier for me to go to graduate school in Louisiana. Cheaper. More convenient for my family, who I miss desperately. One of my best friends might be going there too, and we could live together. But I can feel the pressure coming back. Honestly, it is only the pressures from the people of the church I used to go to that I am truly worried about. I do not want to let that crush me. I can be myself away from them. And it isn't like I can un-know them, especially since I would be going to school in a city that has a satellite campus of my old church.
If I could have my way about this, I would be able to stay in Chicago and allow myself to grow in the church I am attending. I would continue to connect with my sisters in the alumnae group. I would pursue my graduate education in the city which helped inspire my social justice aim in my education.
For now, though, I will look forward to 2014 and graduation and 7 more months of Chicago. Who knows what those months have in store for me.
<3 Amber Marie
p.s. This is so not the post I intended it to be. I was just going to post all the things I've done since being in Chicago and friends I've made, etc. I'm not sorry for what it turned out to be, but I feel like I might have misled the reader to believe that it was going to be a more uplifting post. I had a lot to get off of my chest. There's some still there, but this feels better. Thanks for sticking through it.
p.p.s. Bonus points to whoever figures out what 'BKN' stands for. It's not really that hard, if you know me.
