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Winding around to satisfaction
May. 1st, 2005 06:57 pmTam Lin, and buying islands. I think of that house, with Karen and Cody, and of J.'s Netside.
I seem to have gone through this a little earlier than most people, because of Windsor House. Tam Lin is a lot of the reason that I've wanted to go to college - a "real" college, where I am immersed in not just a curriculum but a community, because I have always been a sucker for community, for the sort of membership that I felt from that book. Now I'm in Langara, which isn't really that - I would say that I've made friends, but it's a sort of sideways bonding; nothing full-on and intense. And I will probably eventually transfer to a proper university and do heaven-knows-what and I have no idea to what degree I'll feel a part of it.
It can be both unhealthy and kind of heady and glorious to consolidate most of your emotional life in a single, small, insular group of people. Which is a subtly but importantly different thing from being able to give yourself wholly to the love of a specific time and place and fellowship, even knowing it cannot endure for long. I don't know if I want the Tam Lin university experience the way I once did; I think I'd probably value it if I had it, but I don't know if I'm yearning for it. It's been a little while since I lost the constant presence of the Windsor House community in my life (which is sort of my own fault as much as anything, though it could not help being lessened); it could be that I'm wary of another home which I'll inevitably need to leave.
On the other hand, it's possible that I don't feel the need for such a thing very sharply because what I've got now is pretty good. Though I hadn't consciously marked the transition, I'm not nearly so lonely or frightened right now as I was during the Summer or Fall (which observation is intended as no slight to the various #hinotori and #waitility folks who formed the main bulwark against that loneliness at the time); I have AD&D and school and the play and the Philosophy group and various people throwing occasional parties and periodic excursions with Andrew (although he may be leaving for a distant university soon, and I will miss him). I'm not entirely content, but it would seem that I am happy.
I seem to have gone through this a little earlier than most people, because of Windsor House. Tam Lin is a lot of the reason that I've wanted to go to college - a "real" college, where I am immersed in not just a curriculum but a community, because I have always been a sucker for community, for the sort of membership that I felt from that book. Now I'm in Langara, which isn't really that - I would say that I've made friends, but it's a sort of sideways bonding; nothing full-on and intense. And I will probably eventually transfer to a proper university and do heaven-knows-what and I have no idea to what degree I'll feel a part of it.
It can be both unhealthy and kind of heady and glorious to consolidate most of your emotional life in a single, small, insular group of people. Which is a subtly but importantly different thing from being able to give yourself wholly to the love of a specific time and place and fellowship, even knowing it cannot endure for long. I don't know if I want the Tam Lin university experience the way I once did; I think I'd probably value it if I had it, but I don't know if I'm yearning for it. It's been a little while since I lost the constant presence of the Windsor House community in my life (which is sort of my own fault as much as anything, though it could not help being lessened); it could be that I'm wary of another home which I'll inevitably need to leave.
On the other hand, it's possible that I don't feel the need for such a thing very sharply because what I've got now is pretty good. Though I hadn't consciously marked the transition, I'm not nearly so lonely or frightened right now as I was during the Summer or Fall (which observation is intended as no slight to the various #hinotori and #waitility folks who formed the main bulwark against that loneliness at the time); I have AD&D and school and the play and the Philosophy group and various people throwing occasional parties and periodic excursions with Andrew (although he may be leaving for a distant university soon, and I will miss him). I'm not entirely content, but it would seem that I am happy.
