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7 January 2007:
I witnessed a friend’s wedding today. It is with mixed surprise and admiration that I look upon the bride and the entirely different life that sets out before her, from tonight, or from the moment she chose her destiny. Coming home, lying on my bed, it is quite impossible to catch a wink before the dinner tonight. I am tired, conscious of the relentless pounding in my head, but more conscious of the fear that stirs beneath. I have woken up at 4:45 am to head to her house by 5am in the cold wee hours of the morning. She has woken and has decided to marry at nineteen, which is surprising because we have grown accustomed to “marrying later”. I fear but I am not sure where this arises from. School is starting tomorrow; there are a million things to be done, to print my lecture notes, to collect English text, Anthropology text, to buy my Lit books, to finalize my timetable. These small tasks that I write on my Notepad and tick off at each following night tell me they are insignificant beside events and bigger decisions, such as marriage. There is a fear that bites me and I cannot find it. I am apprehensive, is that too strong, of the life that starts tomorrow, the semester that I hope is not a follow of every semester to be. I am quite scared, just a bit, of life’s uncertainty, of finding the ideals in every single aspect. The need to be fulfilled and satisfied, to maintain a form of balance in society as we share, talk, laugh, boast, cut. I am planning my life, grounded by the academic timetable. Come May, I might head to Grand Canyon to work. Come Next August, I might head to UK to study. There are so many things which I do not know and that is what fears me, is that right? The big philosophical questions, stingingly unanswered, knock on my face waiting to be addressed, which I brush off most of the time. What am I living for, Are human beings essentially the same, Why must I constantly search for definitions, Is that necessary. Sometimes, I yearn for age. I enjoy being young, but I recognize the fact, or is it disillusion, that uncertainty disappears with age since wisdom accompanies experience, which is inevitably linked to age. Her wedding is a kind of finalization in a section of her life, if we compartmentalize life into different categories. Her wedding is a reminder that I am stepping on my world with tender toes.