What I Learned Of Myself From A Day In The Woods

Saturday was absolutely gorgeous, and as such, some friends and I went in search of swimmable water. Someone had told us about a local swimming hole and supposedly one of my friends had been there once, but we weren't really all that sure of where it was. Nonetheless, we set out in what we assumed to be the general direction of it.

About fifteen minutes later, we noticed a few cars parked on the side of the road near a path leading off into the woods. Figuring this to be the swimming hole, we too parked and headed down that path, only to find a shallow river. We were a bit disappointed, to be sure, but it was still quite the find and at the very least we could wade out into the middle and the water would only come up to our calves. I didn't have a suit, but I hitched up my shorts a bit and started into the river, towards a little grassy island a few yards away.

I sat on the downstream tip of the island with my feet in the water and watched fish and various other items pass me by on either side. This got me thinking about where I am in life right now, and how it is I got here. Graduation is in two weeks, but I won't be walking. Instead, for the second year in a row, I will watch as nearly everyone I know moves into the next stage of their adult lives while I put off graduating yet again. If I'm to be perfectly honest, I'd have to say that I am terrified of graduating. On the one hand, of course I'm excited about the prospects of the rest of my life, but I have a lot of qualms with "the unknown," and I have a history of clinging desperately to "the known," which often resurfaces my latent depression. All the meanwhile, life passes me by on all sides.

This train of thought was beginning to get to me, so I had no problem when my friends suggested we continue on our search.

Another couple of miles down the road, we stumbled upon a similar congregation of cars and path as before, and so again we parked and again we headed into the woods. After following the path down a rather steep hill, we came upon...a dam and an old access road. Once again, it wasn't quite what we were hoping for, as it looked a bit murky for swimming, but as it had more sunlight and places to lay, it seemed we'd stick around for a bit.

The service road ended a few hundred yards to our right at the base of the dam and curved off out of sight in the other direction, which seemed like the perfect opportunity to go exploring. From the bend in the road, though, we could see that the road disappeared into the reservoir. This struck me as a bit odd, so I continued to follow it.

Eventually the road, which was never more than 5 inches below the surface of the water, became a sandbar, which in turn eventually turned back into a road and re-emerged a few hundred yards after first disappearing into the water. When I got back to my starting point, I looked back across to where the road should have been to figure out why I hadn't seen it at first, and noticed that it was beset on both sides by overgrown shrubs, such that it was nearly impossible to see.

Again I got to thinking. The past five years have not been a waste. I have made invaluable friendships and connections, and have learned quite a bit about a wide array of subjects. Yes, there have been and always will be dark periods along the way, and they may wear me down to nothing at the time, but each time I have and will continue to emerge myself again.

So while it may be very tempting to let myself wallow in depression over not graduating or over the way this year has gone for me, instead I should be focusing on the barely visible spot on the horizon where I re-emerge afresh and set a course for that point, even if the water's too murky to see my feet.