Hey there,

are you guys well? I hope so. And I also hope that you are all content wherever you are with life. And if not, then in preparation to change the direction of your life.

I know it's been very long since I last visited AFF. Ever since university started, I've been honestly busy with real life, in a way I have rarely been in school. I don't want to talk too much about what exactly I've done because it's late (almost midnight) and I have classes tomorrow. But today is a day where my inner introvert and my melancholic self just burst out suddenly.

The past few months have been a crazy transition phase for me. I actually ended up writing a huge post, but I just decided that I'd rather not spam you guys with so much unnecessary information (I kind of just wrote about everything that happened since uni started). I’d rather just tell you guys that I actually changed as a person, intrinsically. I am more extroverted than I was in a long time, I am emotionally so much more in reality than I ever was. And I am still in the middle of changing, in a transition phase.

I met a lot of new people, experienced more things (good and bad) than I did the past three years together, and I learned so much about myself through these experiences. I truly grew as a person. I enjoyed and I suffered. I forced myself out of my comfort zone. I worked really hard. I gained a lot.

But I also lost some things. A certain degree of childlike naivety with regards to romance, and the amazing ability to completely immerse myself in fiction and escape reality anytime I wanted. Additionally, I am a little out of place. I still have to define myself in this new context. I have to integrate these new experiences in my mentality. And I have to get used to the new sides to myself that I just discovered.

I have to do all of that while my usual sanctuary (escapism through fiction) is inaccessible, while I still haven’t found a new sanctuary to flee to when everything is too much. And right now, I am just tired and a little blue.

Today is just a day where I kinda long for my the comfort zone of my old self.

But don’t worry about me, guys. I am motivated to define myself in this new context and make the best of my current fixation in reality. And I will try to integrate my inner introvert and my need for escapism with my new life to find balance. I want to engage in more extracurricular activities (bc currently, I am too focused on curricular activities).

Tomorrow I will cook a great meal for myself, I will work hard in uni, and then I will stop by a creative writing group made of other students.

I’ll end this post with a short poem of sorts that I wrote earlier when melancholy hit me hard.

Footsteps in the snow,

A smile as dawn approaches

Bread crumbs on the table,

A frown as twilight comes

Wrinkles in my blanket,

A sigh as night arrives