Late Night Thoughts with Magdalena

A one sided conversation about growing up with my subconscious Magdalena

BY VISHALLI ALAGAPPAN

I don’t yearn for the years I missed during the peak of the pandemic anymore. I used to grieve the loss of my late adolescence and wonder how I would have turned out had I been able to live in the dorms freshman year and stay up with my best friend from orientation and break up with an incompatible partner. As the world returned to normalcy, I felt more juvenile and insecure than I had back in middle school. I had to learn how to order coffee without stumbling over my words again. I had to learn how to carry a conversation again. I had to find myself again. I’m not saying that I’d do it all over, nor that I’m a better person for having experienced that, but I don’t consider it a misfortune anymore.

I don’t know, Magda. Maybe that time period wasn’t just an outlier in a dataset that I can exclude to make my graph prettier. My graph is wonky and weird but it tells a story. I don’t want to erase a part of my life story just like I don’t want to commit academic fraud. Just like in research, every failure and misstep is a learning experience. You build upon what you already have. I get that it’s just a cliche that people say, but it’s so true. Part of growing up has been accepting all of me, all that I’ve done, and all that has happened to me.

The pandemic really exacerbated my mental health issues and I wasted away into nothingness for two years and I’m still recovering from that major depressive episode. But this year is the first year I feel like an actual college student. I still love my bed, but it is not my only safe space anymore. I still love snacks, but I don’t have to eat my emotions anymore. I still cry, but I can wipe the tears away and assure myself that I’m okay. Maybe this progress is what has helped me leave the shame and bitterness behind. I can see that I’m on the other side and when I look back at the Vishalli from a couple years ago, I don’t want to forget her. She did the best she could and she deserves to be remembered too.

People around me often remark that I seem more mature since my rock bottom. Yet, I still feel like a little kid. It’s like that song, the one that goes, “the more things seem to change, the more they stay the same.” I feel so grown up. I have a credit card, stainless steel cutlery, and I compare gcals to find a time a month out to hang out with friends. Yet I still call my mom before buying cough syrup to remind me which flavor I like and sleep with a stuffed polar bear every night. You know how people always say, “I’m a kid still at heart?” Maybe this is what that is. I’m an adult but 6 year old Vishalli will always want to collect random rocks and 13 year old Vishalli will always want to listen to Fifth Harmony. I’m an amalgamation of Vishallis past. That may seem so obvious and simple, but as someone who has always looked to the future for the ideal version of herself, reflecting on the past and realizing that there will never be an ideal self is huge.

Yeah, I guess that’s true. This is the time of our lives when we have explosive bursts of growth. We learn to balance in our lives, set boundaries, outgrow friendships, navigate quarter life crises. It’s not always linear and it takes a while to actually see the growth. Everything happens so fast and you’re just trying to catch up to the changes. One day you wake up and stop recognizing yourself cause you’ve changed so much. It takes a day like today to just sit and reflect and finally process everything.