The monumental occasion of First Year has drawn to a close and with it came an earthshaking revelation…
I am a delocalized electron.
I have always been a delocalized electron.
I feel that I will always remain a nomadic negatively charged particle in the void of space.
In Organic Chemistry, the resonance effect may be summarized as a chemical phenomenon that is observed in organic compounds with double bonds. In these cases, the p-orbitals of two adjacent carbon atoms overlap and the associated electrons become delocalized – they do not belong to any particular atom or bond. These electrons seem to exist between the spaces they are meant to occupy; they are simultaneously exactly where they should be and are precisely where they should not be.
At the time, I didn’t realize the implications of the resonance effect, seeing as how looking back, high school was an institutionalized routine of block schedules and predictable interactions with friends you would see on a regular basis. It was a safe and structured system that would indirectly dictate the spaces you should occupy based on the bonds you wanted to form. Perhaps this method of inducing human interaction was meant to work in our favour. Each individual, as an electron, revolved around their respective social circle, their class schedule, their extra-curricular activities; consequently, seemingly permanent bonds were formed. The longer you were a part of the system, the more definite the expectations of the spaces you were meant to occupy became. They were comfortable. Most electrons were fortunate enough to establish their place in a stable, invariable molecule and maintain their place once removed from this contained environment.
I was not most electrons. For whatever reason, practically unaware, I was chosen to be a catalyst. The expectation established in my case was that I did not and could not be bound to a specific space to occupy.
I was always a part of the reactions – the interactions between different molecules and their respective electrons – but ultimately never had my own place in the equation. I engaged in several different bonds: the academic circles, the dance and arts organizations, the professional associations, the service clubs; I was neutral enough to react with a number of different groups of atoms and electrons, but looking back, as an independent electron, I was delocalized from the start.
In congruence with the romanticized idea of the nomadic lifestyle, I enjoyed not belonging to a singular stable molecule at the time. I was grateful for the fact that I never felt confined, as I had created my own space in between all other places in which I could freely interact with a vast variety of different molecules.
I had no issue with being exactly where I was not meant to be until I reached the end of the four years realizing that in actuality I could not say that I knew precisely where I was meant to be.
Most of my friends continued to maintain their electrostatic attractions; stationary enough to feel comfortable, secure in their bonds. This electron was not associated with the equation, and in nomadic-fashion, it followed its own electric current and relocated.
The year that followed was infinitely different from the familiar high school regimen in the country I had learned to call home for the majority of my life. It was the first time that I was fully and completely on my own.
I was a delocalized electron and this time I felt it.
The energy that ran through the veins of my city, generated by the intricacies of a metropolis faded away and it was replaced with the gentle hums of an intellectual hive masked by a slower Southern pace. I discovered that people here made noise in a different manner, often unnecessarily. I also found that without that institutionalized block schedule and induced human interaction, life was lonely. I had previously become familiar with the concept of being lonely but it did not seem as apparent when high school was designed so that, at least physically, you would never be apparently alone. The nuance here was that, believe it or not, I was lonely and that feeling of being apparently alone became normalized. In many ways I longed for that stability. I looked around me and realized that several of the other electrons I encountered in this new current had too maintained stationary electrostatic attractions.
I was a delocalized electron and this time I felt it.
Days passed. Days summed to weeks. Weeks tallied to months. Months soon became semesters and I began to accept my fate quite happily. The scarce occasions in which I would return home allowed me to recognize that there still existed a few bonds that I could maintain. However, it still held true that I would never truly be a part of their lives – their atomic composition, and that was still mildly polarizing. On the other hand, college has this beautiful ability to alter expectations such that you have more ownership over them; there is less propriety. Although, surprisingly, many people still uphold social expectations of others and deem it inadmissible when electrons don’t conform to the spaces they are meant to occupy, the distance you can generate in college is one of its greatest perks. I slowly began to establish my own expectations and find the spaces I felt I was meant to occupy. In college, the bonds you form are no longer on the basis of proximity or convenience because in some respect, everyone in their own sense is a delocalized electron to a certain degree.
With the conclusion of First Year, I find myself elated to be home; to, in part, reclaim fragments of the familiar past, although a considerable amount has changed. With that, I believe that the greatest change I’ve witnessed is the change I’ve seen in myself as a person. Even as a delocalized electron, I now understand that as a participant in resonance I have formed a double bond; there is overlap between the place that I have always called home and the one I have recently adopted. With that, I cannot say that I belong to either one of them completely; I am simultaneously exactly where I should be and am precisely where I should not be. Amid the dichotomy between the two spaces I am meant to occupy, I feel an undeniable pull toward both of them. In this strange paradox I can never fully claim my life and my space belonging entirely to either reality. While away from everything familiar, I miss everything about home, yet while present in this home I long for the people, the places and everything I’ve established for myself elsewhere.
Perhaps, I will always feel this sense of displacement. Perhaps different degrees of lonely should not impact the truth I’ve always lived.
Sometimes I wonder if my affinity toward the atoms that surround me are of a magnitude that originates from my own accord, or if I am simply lost in the in between. I am terrified of admitting to the later, therefore, (at least for now) I will be content feeling settled in a chronically unsettled position.
Is there any place that I am meant to be?
Perhaps it isn’t a matter of where I am meant to be, but what I am meant to be.
heartonherkeys 