Plastic Tubs Should Never Be Orange

As I stared at the orange plastic tub in the center of my room, I began to understand why everyone hates moving day. It was so final, this orange tub, like a giant yield sign wedged into my plans for the future. I wasn't ready for the year to be over. I wasn't ready to be a sophomore in college. Where did my transition year go? Lost in transition.

I wasn't allowed to be a doe-eyed simpleton anymore. I had to start making plans for next year, then for my internship, then for my career, my marriage, taxes, rent, deadlines, credit checks. When did I get to breathe, and I mean really breathe? That kind of breath that is not invaded by thoughts of the next assignment or waitress gig. When did I get to feel the freedom of my age for the full beauty that it held and not the responsibilities it entailed? Could it be possible to pause my crammed classroom knowledge for just a small fraction of my life and learn the things that the world could only teach me?

I realized in this sheer desperate moment that I did not belong behind a desk taking notes, but in a tent on the side of a mountain somewhere writing in a leather-bound journal. There was one problem with this: I was safe behind that desk. I was safe behind my competitive GPA and well-phrased research papers. College was the next logical step for me. This all made sense. This all made sense. This all had to make sense.

No matter how many times I chanted this empty phrase to myself, I could not make myself buy into the lie. This place could not make sense for me if I was consistently dreaming of something else. I had spent this year wishing that I was the kind of person who did things. Not even anything in particular, just things in general. I wanted to be that person who went to the gym every day. I wanted to be that person who cared about the environment. I wanted to be that person who was confident and directed.

I had to stop wanting to be that person and just be that damn person already. I had to stop wasting my life picturing myself as someone else in order to lull myself to sleep at night. This had to end now. I had to finish hiding behind the self-improvement process and do something to actually improve my life. Maybe the most insane thing in the world right now was the only thing that made sense for me. Maybe I had to do the thing that no one else would understand in order to finally understand myself.

And so there I was, staring down the "path less traveled by" and frozen in fear. I knew I couldn't afford to stay, but taking that step seemed too radical for moving day. Suddenly, I could not contain the pressure of the choice and walked from my room to the bus stop. I rode the bus for one full cycle before getting off at the very corner I had gotten on.

After getting in, I sat down and stared at the orange plastic tub in the middle of my room. I knew why everyone hated moving day.