In which the drivel ran dry.

I graduated college yesterday with all the pomp and circumstance which the situation warrants. I usually can't help but roll my eyes over people who do things like, for instance, try to quote philosophers or post song lyrics in their Facebook statuses to try to convey how significant such a day is to them. I know there's importance in days like these. I studied books. I get symbols. But at the same time, there's a very cynical side of me that sits on the sidelines and says, rather drily, that symbols are only important because we say so.

But tonight, after having spent my first lovely, post-graduate day lolling around with my family, I took some white wine and some tea into a very hot bathtub and mulled things over. I started this journal (and I say journal because the word blog, while perhaps more accurate, is still a little repulsive to me) four years ago at the very start of this stage of life, the stage which I am now transitioning out of. I was a very sad person then, and I can see that in my own text. Or, rather, I can see it in between my own text. That's the thing about your own writing - only you know what you chose not to say along with what you did. It leaps out at me, at least, what I didn't say. Whether I'm inclined to general melancholy or whether it's a thing forced upon me is a train of philosophy I've pondered over a lot in my life, but I took two more years after the start of this journal just to wallow in that sadness. I had moved to a new place, but old things weighed me down so heavily that I might as well have stood still.

Thankfully, even that prolonged state of unhappiness couldn't sustain itself much longer than it did, and little rays of thought peeked through that said, If you're unhappy, what are you going to do about it? I wasn't trying, and as a very wise man once wrote, "Cause and effect, buddy, cause and effect. The only thing you can do now, the only religious thing you can do, is act. Act for God, if you want to — be God's actress, if you want to. What could be prettier? You can at least try to, if you want to — there's nothing wrong in trying." So I did. I tried to put myself in positions that were different, perhaps uncomfortable at first but gradually becoming better and better, and slowly slowly my wheels started revolving in the other direction. The state of sadness did not go away in a puff of smoke. That would be childish to think. But I took a hard look at myself, finally, and realized that so much of its foundation was in the fact that I was holding on to that sadness with clenched fists, yet still lamenting the fact that I did so. And - what's to lose? - I tried to let it go. In those last two years I went places and met people and did things, big and small, huge and trivial, that were so good for me. I made most of the prerequisite college mistakes in those next two years, I had fun, I was frustrated, I was smart and I was an idiot, just like everyone else. And just like everyone, I finally grew up, however many steps behind I was. But what does that matter? I did it.

Like I said, I naturally roll my eyes when people try to make symbols out of calendar events, but at the same time I feel the same gravitational pull to do the same. I did it yesterday. I went up on stage, shook hands with a few officials, got a gold cord. As I walked back to my seat, I looked down at the gold cord and then around at the faces and declared it had been good. That's making a symbol of it, in its way. So I'll do it one more time. While I believe it was Lisa who at one time dubbed this place a "drivel page," it was my own haphazard choice that decided on the URL. Ghwerig was a random choice at the time; I tend to choose names or fixtures from stories I like, and I have no recollection of attaching any significance to this one. The more I mulled it over in the bath tonight, though, the more appropriate it seemed. Ghwerig was a little troll who lived in darkness and worked the same treasure over and over. I might not have thought so then, but that was something like who I was when I started this journal. I'd rather not be attached to that image anymore, though, so I'm leaving it behind. This journal will stay intact, but I'll be posting here from now on, a new page attached to the same account, with a URL equally chosen at random as I mentally perused images from stories I'd recently read and liked. Again, it doesn't have any particular significance, but maybe it will find one in four, five, six years' time. That page will be identical to this one in nearly every way. It'll be the same old me, same old stuff. I'm rolling my own eyes at myself a bit here, but I'll afford myself this one little symbol and jump ship. If you've stuck with me, I thank you. It really does mean more than I can say that anyone cares to read anything I write. Hope to see you over there, too.

And with that, we leap!