I was looking for my old journal today. No, it's not leather-bound or dog-eared. It does not have tear-stained pages or exclamation points cheering on my daily achievements. It is on my laptop, a Word document with little punctuation and too much rumination. It is not a very good journal, but it seems right.
You may be wondering why I was searching for the sad, trite, overly cerebral whispers of my adolescence. It has a lot to do with the sad, trite, overly cerebral whispers of my present. My journal is and was many things. It is an account of my attempts to impress my peers, my parents, myself. It is a discourse between my inner self and outer self. But mostly it is a struggle. It is not accurate in its telling of my life, but it seems good enough.
You may be wondering why I stopped using my journal. I think it's the same reason I was just today searching for my forsaken words. Like the furiously yet deliberately typed letters of my electronic diary, I am conflicted.
The confusion started when I first realized that I could do something bad, and that it could hurt me, or hurt others. Or just hurt. I've never killed anyone - I even carry spiders outside to their proper homes. I've never slandered anyone or lied to any major extent. But I have not been a model of virtue either. I've stayed out too late; I've said too much, or not enough; I've been irresponsible; I've flirted with danger. And I've asked myself a thousand times, "Is this OK?"
That's why I was looking for my journal. I wasn't looking to reminisce or to laugh at my teenage follies. I was looking for affirmation. Was I just as confused then as I am now? Yes. Did I have answers then that I don't have now? I'm not sure.
At the end of the day I don't know how to be good and how to be right. I'm not even sure if there's a difference.\nI remember distinctly my first foray into the world of the morally muddled. I was on the verge of 16 and everything I did and felt was completely transparent. I was quite satisfied with daily routines and the occasional trip to the movies during a Friday night. Life was simple in that whatever felt good was good. My desires and actions never led me to question my goodness.
My sister and I went to prom that year. As 10th-graders going with seniors we were pretty certain of our awesomeness. I was excited, a little nervous, happy with my dress. Simple, simple, simple.\nAnd then there was the after party. I sipped a drink, looked around at the older kids, smiled, then paused, then started to frown. These people felt good, I was certain of it. They were laughing and dancing and completely engaged. But it didn't seem right, and as my mother frantically texted me about my whereabouts, things weren't so simple any more.
My perplexity at why people do the things they do has not waned. In 10th grade I didn't understand the appeal of alcohol. As a senior I couldn't fathom why people wanted to party in a field. And in college ... well that would resemble more of a novel than a 900-word column. As an introspective, self-aware, constantly analytical human being, you'd think I wouldn't need to survey the outside world for answers to my own questions of morality. But I'm not really sure where else to look. I've exhausted my own feebly constructed moral compass; it doesn't seem to know much more than I do. I have no higher power to guide me. So I look to others for hints, gestures, signs. How does one feel good without feeling guilty? How do you know when you're right?
I recently told a friend that I am "prone to excess." I can't really think of a better way to describe the dilemma of the college student. I've never been presented with so many choices in my life. What classes to take, what food to eat, who to see, where to go and what to do. But it all boils down to the same haunting dichotomy: virtue and vice. Happy in the midst of bacchanalian revelry, sad in the throes of guilt.
I still receive texts, not quite so frantic, from my mother: "What are you doing tonight?" I've seen and done a lot of things since that first worried text from her, things at which my 10th-grade self would probably gawk. But I still retain that simple sense of confusion: Why and how do people do the things they do? I looked for my journal today because I want to know what my next plan of action should be. Every week it's different. Every week I come to a new conclusion: this is good, this is bad. I observe those around me, some who adhere to my transient list of principles, others who shy from it, many who laugh that I even try to make a list at all.
My 16-year-old self probably would not approve of my weekend plans. She wouldn't understand my lack of self-control, my life bereft of balance. I wouldn't blame her, I wouldn't try to explain or justify my actions. I would tell her that regardless of whether it feels good or feels right, whether the feeling only lasts a day or lasts forever, it won't ever feel simple. And it never should.
Mary Scott's column runs biweekly Wednesdays. She can be reached at m.hardaway@cavalierdaily.com.
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