Left or right, black and white: that’s as simple as decisions seem. What about the middle, what about the gray area? That’s where I am. I don’t know whether to stay with what I know or go into the unknown. I hate not belonging somewhere which is why I fear the unknown. But the unknown also has one of the greatest things in my life. So which do I choose?

My classmates don’t know my name; everyone is full of empty stares when my name hits the Kahoot scoreboard. People mutter my name to themselves, they loudly ask the class who I am. Little do they know I’m sitting two seats behind them. 

My friends tell me I do not listen. I try and I try to listen, but my mind is in different places. Yet the second I start talking, they’ll always listen. I feel guilty; I feel bad.  For once I feel like I have people to talk to. I know that I need to listen in order to keep those friends. I listen to the yelling of being told I need to listen. I see the toll my actions take on others.

I feel lost; I feel guilty.

I hope to not be lost like a missing sock. I do not want to enter the dryer to never see the warm laundry room lights—or any other lights for that matter. I fear not knowing where I’ll end up. If I become the sock, I’ll end up somewhere I don’t belong.

I’m not quite sure I know where I am right now. Maybe it’s a crossroad or whatever people say this tearing feeling is. To be quite honest, I know I am at a crossroad, but the line dividing the paths is not clear between my two options. My crossroad feels like it’s in the middle of a thick forest filled with fog. The actual paths are just two janky dirt deer trails.

I don’t think I am okay with that.

If I choose one path I leave all I know and love, but also all I know and hate. If I choose the other, there will be little that I know, and possibly even more that I hate. Somehow, I feel more drawn to the second path. Away from all I know, maybe I can start fresh. Maybe I can listen, Maybe I can be a better friend. Maybe my name can be known. 

I feel trapped in the first path. I’m already on this path like I always have been. I’m suffocated by my feelings. The second path could be a long-awaited breath of fresh air. I can’t ignore the pull I feel to the dirt path that I have never known.

Maybe being not okay will let me finally go with my gravitational pull to the unknown.