Crossing into the Dark.

I am feeling the foreboding sense, as if something bad is bound to happen once I step foot on campus. I am indeed scared of what is to come, of the unknown. I close my eyes, clench my fists, and take one step into darkness. The darkness will engulf me as easily as the eagle takes the fleeing rodent and I will be lost.

This is the name of the blog.

LOST.

Who knows how I'll be found. I'll probably flail my arms around, desperately wanting to feel something familiar. I'll hold out my hands blindly hoping to bump against a wall and at least have myself a path to go along. But nay, I will stray and no one will be within earshot to hear my cries for help.

A little part of me will die as I head down to San Diego. This comfortable life that I became so immersed in for the past 17 years will end. When people make all kinds of epic analogies connecting college to a "new chapter" or "the beginning of a great journey", you never really get it. It's just like, "cool!" and it definitely is obvious that we don't comprehend the gravity of what that really means. We've experienced nothing like this before. We don't know what it's like to spread our wings and go off on our own. We just don't know. We don't know life outside of our high school friends, high school class periods, curfews, parents, and memories.

The part of me that wants to hold on to all of that will die. I have no choice. Even if I wanted to clasp my hands around the fleeting entity that I call "the past" and bring everyone I love back home where they belong, it wouldn't happen. I would love for me to spend my lazy summer days with Sarah again. I would love to do my silly handshake with Jillian. I would love for Kevin, Sunada, Nori, Wes, and I to get together for video games. I would love for Wes and I to hang out everyday and just do nothing. I would love for me to hang out with all kinds of people and eat meals with them. I would love for another chance, another way to go back to the times when saying "I love you and you mean a lot to me" would actually mean something. Now it's like, everyone's moved on, you've moved on. Bringing up memories, trying to resurrect old feelings, it's frowned upon. Everyone's got their own lives now.

The part of me that wants to stay will die. I must move on myself. It's inevitable. We make awesome plans to keep in touch, to always talk, and to always video chat, aim chat, whatever. We try to plot out our schedules to see and talk to our high school friends who, once again, we desperately try to hold on to. It's like that. We stand right on the line. A dark figure demands that we choose a side; we can either just stay in our comfort zones and stay home and live in our fantasy world where high school will always reign supreme, or we can move on to college and accept the fact that most of us will indeed drift. Seeing as how the first option is quite impossible, I go back to the fact that we have no choice but to move on.

I will return. We're all going to return. We'll probably make plans to congregate at someone's house. All of us are going to anticipate it, we'll feel it deep in our gut. We haven't seen each other in AGES, it's that feeling where it's like, "Gee, wonder if they've changed?" And it turns out, yeah, we've changed. I've felt it before. Someone who used to be my best friend, David, went to Berkeley. He came back and we hung out over Thanksgiving. Words cannot describe just how different it was. The comfort that I had with him was gone. It was like I was meeting him for the very first time. He may have been the same person, but yet, everything about him was just so different to me and it was not such a pleasant feeling in my heart.

So what are the chances of all of us feeling that? Very high. Most of us won't even recognize each other. Our connections will resort to past memories; the present and future might even be completely dead.

A new chapter means...well, a new chapter. We've been living the same chapter for the past 18 years. I want to know if I'll start out this new chapter with excitement and something worth reading about. A dull exposition is highly frowned upon and bores readers to tears. There is no motivation. There is no reason to continue reading. A dull exposition is an invitation to stop reading and lose faith in the writing community of the present. So is that how I want my new chapter to my LIFE to be? To have no exciting stories about college, nothing fond to look back on and smile, nothing to laugh about, it should be quite depressing.

So as I cross over into the dark, I hold out my hands, hoping that someone will grab it and lead the way.

God, oh God. I know that He is there. I freak myself out over nothing; I overthink the impossible and distort those impossibilities into possibilities. I do nothing but overly prepare myself for a horrendous situation that isn't even 2% as horrendous as I thought it would be. God is always there to keep me sane. I flail my arms blindly, yelling for help, feeling the darkness fill my soul with dread. It's not a good feeling, dread. Then I feel a warm firm grip on my hand and I stop flailing immediately and grow silent. I feel my soul becoming warm, I feel it rising up in me. The peace I feel is unspeakable. It's just so comfortable, the darkness is nothing to me anymore. I hear a gentle soothing voice reassuring me that the situation is under control and that nothing is too big for Him.

I know sometimes I'll try to let go. I'll fight the grip. I think I can walk the darkness on my own sometimes. I fill my head with all kinds of crazy thoughts that I can definitely navigate through the depths of this unknown without any assistance. Then I trip and skin my knee. I'll probably cry out again like a child. And then, He'll come, He'll be there like a loving father concerned about his hurt child.

This is God. This is how I know Him to be.

Through His guidance, I will stay on a straight path and be faithful. I will worship and praise Him for His mercy and faithfulness. My journey may have begun long ago; hell, I'm getting tired and He must be too. But I know He'll be there constantly, eventually leading me to my Home.

You know what. I will indeed come back to Cerritos a new person. I hope to be wiser and more mature. I hope to indeed become a better person as the days progress.

College makes it so much easier to just get lost.

But He will remain faithful. And I will no longer be

LOST.