Omniclimactic

The old Syracuse house has been mostly empty and quite since I got back from New Hampshire. Despite the warm weather and sun, I’m dragging. I’m feeling lazy and at the same time feeling an urgency to get the hell out. I pull the suitcases and boxes from my closet and start to transport my clothes from the bureaus into the luggage. Where is Vaughn? Where is everybody?

Later, some of the family is finally around. “Well, I think I’m leaving on Saturday,” I announce to Michael, my surrogate dad/ landlord in Syracuse, as he’s sorting through laundry. I haven’t seen anyone in the family all day and it seems like during the past few days everyone’s been off doing their own things or hanging with the family. Basically, there’s been quite a bit of Becca neglect in the house. I’m ok with that.

He stops sorting and looks up. “Wow,” he says, “that’s really something. On to the next step of your life.”

“Yeah, I feel ready,” I say. He goes into his usual spiel about how I should be confident in my writing and the hardest thing to do is have ideas so if I’m having those, I need to pursue them. I know. I know. He tells me that I just need to write and then one day my stories will be picked up by Hollywood and turned into films. Michael’s a Television, Radio, and Film professor and former producer at MTV. I smile and feign enthusiasm. He’s got Hollywood on the mind all the time. As great as sreenplay writing sounds, first I’d like to focus on my own craft (literature) before I go seeking to fulfill someone else’s art. He isn't so concerned with me leaving anyways; his first son is flying the coop in a couple days.

I am fully ready and prepared for an entirely low key departure from this house and Syracuse. There will probably be some hugging, some talk of the future. Sharon (Vaughn’s mom) will mention my return in a year for grad school. Vaughn will freak out a little bit more about going to L.A. Then I will get in my car and drive away. I probably won’t think too much about Syracuse during the five-and-a-half hours back to New Hampshire.

I’ve been experiencing and anticipating anticlimactic goodbyes for about a week now.

“This is too sad,” says Ryan when we’re all hanging out and drinking a few beers the night before convocation last Saturday. “I definitely need to see a few people today. I mean, not you guys, but the people I don’t see that often who I may never see again.”

“I don’t really see the need to do that,” I say. Someone seeking people out who I wasn’t all that close to in the first place, and would likely only see via chance over the years, just to say goodbye and have a nice life, then stare awkwardly at each other for a few seconds, doesn’t seem all that important.

“Well, its like, just to tie up loose ends,” says Laura.

“I don’t know. That always felt so anticlimactic to me. I just feel like the people I want to see before I leave are the people I’m usually surrounded by anyways.”

“Yeah. I guess you’re right.”

I don’t mean to be a cynic. I don’t mean to bring down the mood of the people around me. In fact, it’s kind of the opposite. What’s the use of getting ourselves worked up over inevitable goodbyes? I was always a strong believer that if someone is meant to be in your life, one way or another, they will be in it. Did you forget your ability to make shit happen? (Mike was leaving for Hawaii before I was going back to New Hampshire. I wasn’t going to see him before I go to Luxembourg unless I got home. So I drove home for two nights to see him. Come on people. If it means that much to you, make it happen, ey?)

I think our culture has a lot of trouble letting go – of things, of people, of experiences. We get too attached, too comfortable. I’m most certainly guilty of it. More importantly, we come to depend on other people and other things to ensure we have a good time. Many of us forget how to enjoy our own company and have a good time on our own. Freud and the psychoanalysts call it the “other” or the “O:” the person who we need gazing at us in order to validate our existence and give us meaning.

I see it in married couples a lot. Now, I’ve never been married before so I could have it all wrong. But from what I can tell, a lot of marriages fail because people lose their independent identities and cannot see themselves as something other than half a married couple. So they sacrifice themselves and make themselves dependent. And when a person’s happiness depends on the actions, thoughts, and ideas of another person, shit’s bound to hit the fan.

This entry isn’t about married people. It isn’t about independence. It’s about, well, climax. I drove Andrew to the airport yesterday morning around five. It wasn’t a sad goodbye. Yesterday Linz and I had a goodbye lunch. It wasn’t sad either. It was happy and exciting. She is one of those people whose path will cross with mine again. I have yet to feel sad. Even parting with Spencer, my creating writing conversation powerhouse, one of the most positive forces in my writing process, wasn't so bad.

Everyday, I hug and wish well a couple more friends. I am ready to leave, even anxious for it. Let’s not drag this on. I am ready for the next thing. Mike C. says I’m closed off; that I don’t let people in. Sometimes I worry that I may be a Jane Austin and never marry. Sometimes that thought scared me, and it could be completely wrong. Maybe Mike’s right and I’m scared to let people in. Maybe I could be in love with one person, and it would be the most fulfilling thing ever, if I would only let myself get a little vulnerable. Maybe he's right? In many cultures around the world, people never say godobye to others. They stick around the ones they love.

But if it didn’t ever settle in with one person, it wouldn’t be for lack of love. It would be for lack of loving one person more than another, for favoring one person’s love over another’s. I do need people. I need every person who has ever influenced my life for better, worse, neither or both. So why would I ever be sad to set them free? Why would I ever be sad to anticipate more people flowing in and out? Why would I be sad to be something to them too? Maybe it’s not anticlimactic; maybe it’s omniclimactic: timeless, spaceless, and totally great.