My friend, myself, and the precipice of change
You don't always know the moment when your life is going to change forever. Sometimes you step into it, look up, and realize the place you're at now could have gone a vastly different direction if you had moved slightly just a year or two back. But, sometimes you get to lean directly over the edge. You see what will happen before you take a plunge, for better or worse.
2011-2013
My years in graduate school were another high point in my life. I was living with my grandmother in Bryan, and didn't pay rent. I made her meals, kept her company, took her on drives. I had disposable income from my stipend for being a graduate assistant. As a graduate assistant, I had to be available tohelping professor 20 hours a week. I delivered tests, got to help with research, and even got to cowrite and present a paper. I did my first ever lecture over Third Parties for my mentor's Introduction to Political Science class. I wore crisp shirts, ties, vests. I got an office with the other TAs, and I offered office hours in addition to my professor. I was footloose and traveled as the winds took me. I was the image of a young academic. (I realize how privileged I am here).
Due to various circumstances which I will leave for another day, I decided I would pursue a job in teaching English as a foreign language in South Korea. I planned to leave in a little under a year. I still lived rent free, but I worked at Whataburger while taking my classes for certification and completing all the administrative paperwork to reach Korea.
I spent a lot of time with my best friend from high school during my two years of grad school and one year of flipping burgers. We miraculously maintained our friendship even after we were no longer hanging out in the cafeteria every day.
I have mentioned him elsewhere on the blog. We met up sporadically through college, but mostly just contacted each other through AIM or played video games over the internet together as he was up in Dallas and I was in Huntsville. I only visited him once when he was in undergraduate school, and the same was true for him visiting me.
But during graduate school? He was in Houston, and my school was still in Huntsville. Suddenly, meet ups became monthly affairs. I would crash a weekend at his place, he would meet me in the Woodlands after graduate assistant hours. Thing slowed down slightly when I was working at Whataburger as I worked the weekends.
All this is to say, we are quite close and have tumbled over many precipices together.
2026
My friend and his partner came down from Dallas to visit this past weekend. My friend wanted us to hang out, and to show his partner the places he lived when he was a resident of the Bayou City. We had done this as a trio last year when we went to Bryan. I didn't mention this in the original blog post, but my friend and his partner were with me on the trip where I learned that I love wide open spaces.
The two of them came to meet my wife and I for lunch, before I joined them for their drive around the city's sights.
He drove out to the last residence he had stayed at before leaving Houston for brighter pastures - an apartment complex in a cozy part of Houston surrounded by the beautifully verdant elm trees and pines. It was a gated community, so we couldn't go in, but we paused and talked for a while parallel parked on the street. It was a surprisingly comfortable summer twilight, leaves gently swaying in the breeze. The fiery yellow of the setting sun gave a hazy feel of nostalgia.
September 2014
I was visiting my friend in Houston. We and some of his local friends had eaten at a swanky steak house for dinner. It was a celebration of his new job in Alaska. How cool is that?
Literally cool, 50F in the summer (or 10C for you non-Americans). Even in September of 2014, the weather could creep up into the 90s. It was well after dark, but that had done little to make make the outside less of a sauna.
My friend and I were alone, standing at the same place we would be standing again twelve years later. It was the first time we had been alone all night. I think we both felt the melancholy tension: in just two months, I would be leaving for South Korea.
We often stalled our departures, eager to keep talking by our cars until one of us bit the bullet and broke it with a handshake. Tonight felt different though.
My friend was the one who brought up the elephant of the room first.
"This might be the last time for a while."
"Yeah," I agreed.
We had just migrated to WhatsApp, but we still had a twelve hour difference between us. It would be a year before we saw each other again. We shook hands one more time, an air of uncertainty before we went over the edge.
Present
Things did change. We haven't stopped being friends, but it's gotten harder to make time to hang out. I went into public education not long after I returned from Korea. We carved out time with camping, but my torn Achilles tendon was disasterous for my morale.
But, I have a full schedule laid out for this camping season. More time outside - more time with my friend. Going over the precipice of change is a natural part of life moving forward. It doesn't have to meaning losing what you love.