Life Changes

I've noticed a sort of weird thing in the recent years: Whenever something that seems like a major change in my life has happened, I haven't felt like anything has changed at all. I immediately get used to it and it feels like it's always been the way it is now.

I think I've been wondering about that ever since I moved away from home and started university. That should've been a big life change, but it wasn't. Literally the most significant thing about it was "Yay, I can eat as much frozen pizza as I want."

The same year I found the word "asexual" and a whole community of people with experiences similar to mine, but to be honest I wasn't even surprised. It was cool to talk to others like me, but it was like the word immediately became a part of my identity and I didn't really need to digest it.

I think I've been thinking this again, because I just moved to a new apartment a couple of weeks ago after living in the same place for five years, and I already feel as if I've always been living here. Like every corner is as familiar as the back of my hand. Sure, I still get excited about how much more space I have now, but essentially I feel just as much at home as I've always felt.

However, I think the most hilarious example is, when I started dating my roommate and best friend last year, because our situation is anything but ordinary. I honestly believed I would never date anyone because I had no desire to, and wasn't attracted to anyone. She on the other hand was a Mormon and convinced that she was straight. And now it feels like we've always been dating.

It's funny how you can prevent yourself from seeing the obvious when you believe something. Apparently, being best friends and even living together for years without realizing you're in love with each other is not just movie stuff. It can really happen. It happened to us. (We were also one of those couples who everyone else thought was together long before it happened.)

Having romantic feelings for someone for the first time in my life should've been big. Seeing my best friend, now girlfriend, leave the religion she'd believed in for 25 years, partly because of me, should've been big. And sure, when I think about it, I can say it was, but in the end not really. Because it still feels like nothing has changed.

And I think I've come to realize why that is. If a change is natural, if it's good for you, and if it's actually already a part of who you are, it's not going to feel mindblowing. It's going to feel like the most natural thing, because, it is.