Like most other college students, I went home for thanksgiving, and it was amazing to be home. As much as I love being on my college campus in Illinois, there’s nothing quite like being home in Grand Rapids. It’s familiar. I get there and immediately feet at home. Honestly, I have to remind myself when I go home that my life has changed. I’m not in high school anymore. And thank goodness that I’m not in high school anymore. Don’t get me wrong, high school had its moments. But a lot of things happened in those four years that my heart has healed from and would like to stay healed from. This can become a difficult task when you go home and suddenly everywhere you look is a reminder of high school. When I came back to my college campus after break, I had several conversations with other people that experienced this same feeling of nostalgia, except, this nostalgia is the kind we wish we didn’t feel. So, I figure if a few people on my campus felt the same way I did, there has to be other people other places that could also relate…

The bass that booms throughout my whole core when I blast music in my car reminds me of the times I drove to distract myself. I don’t know if this is just a “me thing” or if others do this too, but when I just wanted to escape life for a while, back in high school, I would go for a drive. I’d find a long country road and just blast my current favorite songs. Sometimes it would be my favorite worship album, and other times the newest Drake song, and even other times it would be a combination of the two. For a while my problems disappeared and it was just me and the open road. So when I went home this weekend and decided to take a drive, the feeling of wanting to escape flooded back to me.

The all too familiar feeling of lying in bed at night and beginning to think..about everything. I would spend hours at night in high school just laying there, trying to go to bed, but my mind wouldn’t shut off. I’d think about the future, but I would also think a lot about the past. Dwelling on the past is a dangerous thing when the past doesn’t want to be dwelled upon. In my experience, I dwell on things far longer than most people. So while everyone else is moving on to the next thing, I’m 10 steps behind them still thinking about the past. This is a dangerous thing, and I was reminded of that this past thanksgiving. I lay in bed and thought about things I hadn’t thought about in ages. Things that honestly, by this point, I shouldn’t think about anymore. But for whatever reason, they’re things I can’t seem to shake.

When you lived in one city for the majority of your life, every building, every restaurant, ever street has some memory connected with it. Some, I’d dare to say most, of these memories are extremely happy to reminisce on. But there are the few memories that you wish you didn’t remember. These are the memories that make it hard to come home and see the all too familiar city that I lived in for so many years.

While going home is great, and I love my hometown. I have also realized that reminiscing isn’t always the best thing for me. Because trying to bring something back that doesn’t want to be resurrected will never work. It’ll only set you up to be disappointed again when you realize you can’t bring back the past. Whether that be a friendship. A relationship. A job. A team you were on. Or whatever it may be. Don’t try to bring things back that want to stay in the past. Because some ghosts of high schools past want to stay just that, ghosts.