"You're the Tom you were always supposed to be."

Someone I knew from high school told me this at a New Year's party a few months ago. At the time, I didn't really think anything of it; in fact, it sounded kind of bizarre. I didn't really know how to take it. It was obviously meant to be a compliment, but it felt sort of similar to a compliment like "Well, at least you aren't as fat as you used to be."

I've spent a lot of time ruminating on it since then. Did I really waste that much time in high school?

I was that miserable kid in the corner. I hated high school. I had virtually no friends. I had a teacher I'd consider a friend and one best friend which ended up in mutual abandonment shortly before high school. I've been wondering what changed between now and then.

The simplest answer? I just stopped caring. That puts the crux more on apathy than anything else, which is a bit misleading, but at the core, that's true. I stopped worrying about who I'm supposed to be or what I'm supposed to do. I'm comfortable in my own skin--for the most part. He said I was standing taller and looked outwardly focused.

He also might have been drunk, so take that for what it's worth.

I think it has at least some truth. In high school? I never would have come even close to regularly working with people or, as is the case semi-regularly now, leading them. I still have to fight those urges to disappear and hide away, every single day. Ultimately, though, I just don't care about everyone else will think about my actions and myself any more.


Well, mostly everyone else.

Several weeks ago when the topic of what I'd be doing when I had to move out of this apartment, another friend said "I just don't want you to turn back into the Tom you used to be when you were living with your parents."

It seems like everyone noticed.

I think the idea that living at home was somehow responsible for it is misguided, but the fear of it happening again if I do have to move back in with my parents probably has some foundation. I think the bigger fear, however, is that I'm going to self-destruct long before that.

I wrote some words, of the 750+ variety, again today.

And today's lyrics: "I don't think they know, that's my heart exposed"