' And the sun will set for you.'

                             

I still remember the day I finished school . How I promised myself I wouldn't cry because I was glad to get away from it all. The teachers, the dingy and dull classrooms and the tiring routine. I fooled myself into believing that I wanted to get away from the gnawing grasp of childhood and all it accompanies.

I ended up crying on my graduation day. My eyes felt like water pipes the knobs of which had broken.

Four years later and I face the same situation once again. I should be better prepared now I think, but letting go gets harder as years pile up on me. 

My only ambition in school was to get to university. I hadn't really spared a thought as to what I was going to pursue after that. Now that it's over I feel almost empty and uncertain.

Uncertain of the future that leads to so many different destinations. So many different paths up for grabs, to be an ardent mother, a headstrong career woman, a traveler. 

Most of us will wander around switching between things we thought we liked and things that are necessary for us to do in order to survive.

That is when we will think of the friends to whose company we had gotten accustomed, that have moved away in distance, however remain etched in our memories.

We will think of the times we cried, pulled our hair out in agony because we were assigned projects we thought were impossible. We will remember then how we successfully completed them together and feel a sense of great accomplishment.

We will smile silently when our mind wanders off to a time when we doubled up in laughter with our friends while imitating our professors. And a teardrop will escape when we wonder where they are now. 

We will probably visit the same restaurants, drink 'karak' from the same tea shop and watch the same TV shows that we used to, but it will never be the same. 

I've come to realize now how much I've grown in the past four years, learned so much from being around great minds, people and personalities and it hurts to bid it adieu.

This time I don't make any false promises to myself instead I'm glad I've had amazing experiences and met wonderful people letting go of whom moistens my eyes.