The rattle of the TTC shakes us awake as we step back into our patterns. Here we go again, this year like the last, though now with much more to say. We try to meet in the same spot by the residence, the one we met in the first year, and the year after that. When we meet, it is like time relaxes, not that we have lost our maturity, but more so that we don’t have to pretend that we have more than we do.

          We try to meet in the morning, though the time often shifts to the afternoon. Still more than enough time to stop by the Med Sci building and grab some cold drinks, so that the wet cups can cool our hands. We can laugh messily, without pressure, without formality. We can talk about plans while loitering by windows without expectation of execution.

                  What do you want to do? I’ll ask you, and you’ll ask me.

After this?

We’re not sure yet, or we were, but it keeps on changing, each option feeling like guesses. When we convene with some of our other friends, some have better clues than us, but the conversation falls by the wayside as the group of us walk lazily in the summer heat, in bumping zigzags, like little kids.

          We will find some place that all five of us can sit, pick up some food from a truck and huddle around one of the grand tables in Robarts. In the first week, there is an echo of excitement that I wish lasted, one that fills the nooks of each place, one that reflects in our voices. As we share each class we’ll take, we’ll place our devices together, align timetables, and map out when our free times overlap. For some moments there is a smile that sits naturally on our lips before it starts to strain our cheeks.

Still, there is a thrill in getting older, in getting the hang of our independence, our individualism. Of choosing the lengths of our hair, and contents of our meals. As we try to find comfort in our reflection and find which roads are our proper directions. There is a trembling in my hands at times, when I remember that this is the time of choosing what will be of us. Of figuring out just where we belong in this world of things. Some fear vanishes when I see that you hold it too, the same panic grin when thinking of all that you want to do. I wish I knew if we were going to the same place, and what would happen if we weren’t.

We will still make grand plans like we always do, delay some, and forget about others, as most plans of ours never come to fruition. We will promise to hang out more than we’ll do, promise to go to a café, but the buses may get too delayed, and we’ll have to rush off to class. There is grace in trying, in adapting. And even if one thing falls through, we can still meet at the entrance of UC and sit together in Gerstein, even if it becomes just once a week when the snow starts to roll through, freezing us away.

Perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself; only a short time has passed since our first day back, and we are a little more than halfway through our time here. There is still time in the day to try and find a place for dinner, to huddle together in a booth like a family, even if just for now. The faces in our group slightly alter over time, but there is still a great familiarity among us, a promise to hold to the moment so that time doesn’t rob us blind. We’re still young while we complain of pains in our bodies. Trying to push ourselves forward as far as we can, so that we can have the best of things. To try not to regret and hold still. So that when time catches us and cements our feet, we can have things to glance back upon, like we have started to do with our younger youth even now. In time, we will start talking of the halls here like we do when we reminisce about our old elementary schools. 

 Still, I like to think there will be time to situate ourselves; we are still just starting now and a far cry from the finish line. Even though as each year passes, time seems to move faster, and when the days dwindle and mash together, we find ourselves counting fingers. Our balance is disturbed by the rockiness of the TTC as it tries to take us home.

With each finger pressed down, there is an excitement and a ballooning in our chests, a fear of bright lights when we will walk down the stage in robes well earned. What will be of us then? It feels like we’ll fall off the other side’s end, but much like when we first came to this place, we will find our steps in whatever place we will go.