Before I dive into my long distance relationship, I want to talk about when I was single. While reading Hannah Hippen’s article “Summer of Love: Dating Myself for a Season,” I was taken back to summer 2014. That summer was the most formative time in my life. I was single and I was getting sh*t done. My personal growth and happiness were my main focus.
Every other morning that summer, I woke up when the morning air was still fresh and crisp. I caught the s57 bus and met up with a friend or two at my high school’s garden. The garden was a new idea at the time, and we were determined to make the small stake of neglected, fenced-in land into something inspiring.
I volunteered at a congressional campaign. I canvassed around Staten Island and met awesome people both within the campaign and out on the street. It made me more tuned to the political climate of my district, which empowered me to take a more active role in politics.
I was also a trainee at Bella Abzug’s Leadership Institute. It was held on the 8th floor of Hunter College in Manhattan. The room’s perimeter consisted of windows that overlooked 68th Street and Park Avenue and the room’s area held a collection of amazing women and girls from all walks of life. Every day for two weeks, we heard influential female speakers, formed friendships, learned the values of feminism and how to debate, ate free food, and, once, even danced to the beat of the live Batala drums.
That summer, my feet pounded, explored, and conquered the city pavement and they moved to the beat of my own drums.
Not long after the summer ended, I started going out with my current boyfriend. From then on, I had the great privilege and disadvantage of loving someone as much as I loved myself. Being in a relationship means there’s always someone there who’s willing to listen to you complain about missing the bus, someone who will tell you you’re still beautiful even after the hairdresser cuts your hair too short, and someone who’s always down to “Netflix and Chill.” For the things I need someone there for, he was/is there, without fail. After a while, however, I couldn’t separate when I wanted to do things with him and when I needed to do things on my own. I just couldn’t say “no” to being with him, because I thought love meant that you have to be with the significant other as much as possible. Thus, it made it harder for me to take care of my studies, my extracurriculars, my friends, my family, and myself. At the time, it felt like I had to give up a lot of my freedom and individualism to prove that I was 100% committed to the relationship. It was the cause of many disagreements, which made me long for the previous summer.
I felt like I lost myself, and I saw college as a new opportunity to focus on the things I had ignored. Like the small stake of neglected, fenced-in land, I wanted to cultivate something inspiring from the neglected parts of my identity.
Breaking up before leaving for college just seemed like the only logical thing to do. I was going to Ohio and he was going to upstate New York. Considering that I’m the type of person to dive into any new situation, I didn’t want anyone to inhibit me from immersing myself in my new environment. The college experience is simply something I didn’t want to compromise. I held the same ideas for him. I didn’t want to stop him from experiencing what everyone claims to be “the best years of your life.” Furthermore, I didn’t want to stay in a relationship in college knowing that the odds would be stacked against us. So, for a long time, we agreed to break it off before we would leave for college.
I guess it was foolish of me to think that we could go on acting the same way towards each other while we had an expiration date hovering over our consciousness. Slowly our relationship started to deteriorate. I felt like I couldn’t even mention the future since he wouldn’t be a part of it. We finally reached our limit; we couldn’t stay in this limbo for much longer. I had to make a decision about what I wanted. I decided that we would give it a try. I owed him at least an honest effort to make it work.
So here we are, 4 months later, having just celebrated our ten months together. It’s only been a few weeks since we left for college, and although it hasn’t been easy, I don’t regret my choice. I don’t feel like having a boyfriend is restricting me from truly experiencing Kenyon. In fact, not needing to go out every chance I get has made me more focused on things that actually matter. I guess I had this notion in my head that the “college experience” primarily involves getting drunk and hooking up, but a real college experience at Kenyon is found outside of Old K’s humid basement parties. A real Kenyon experience, as far as I’m concerned, can include parties, but beyond that, it’s found at a concert in Horn gallery, at the Kenyon farm, under the beech tree, and at Gund Commons with friends on a Friday night watching Parks and Rec.
Source: http://zodiacexplanations.tumblr.com/post/127618027215/leslie-knopeparks…
In all, the distance has actually given me a balance between living my own life and sharing my life with him. Unlike in high school, we’re not physically with each other for most of the day, so I feel like I own my time, my interests, my friends and my experiences, which are unique from his. We’re growing and changing as individuals, but I’m glad that the essence of our relationship has stayed the same. I still complain to him, he still tells me I’m beautiful, and we still “Netflix and Chill” (on Skype).
Image Credit: Facebook, Adoring Zooey Tumblr, Zodiac Explinations