Sky Full of Stars

Albany doesn’t have my gyro man, the Flushing Meadow’s Corona Park, all my favorite places to escape to and so much of all the things I left behind.

It also does not have a lifetime’s worth of bad memories. It does not remind me of being bullied back in middle school when I would walk past the civil court on Sutphin Boulevard, the place where I got the phone call telling me my grandpa had died, or how my four years of high school felt like it went to waste because my best friend couldn’t make it to graduation on time and sit next to me.

But what Albany does have is the stars when I get home from work late. Every night, on weekdays, I walk through Colonie Center’s parking lot, looking up at the sky on my way home. I learned that if I concentrate on one star, the whole sky lights up.

Albany has mountains. Sometimes it catches me by shock when I walk past the Colonie Mall parking lot in the morning, on the way to the 190 bus stop, that I can see the mountains. In fact, if you walk towards the Humanities building and peek through, to the quad in the corner, you can see the mountains in the distance if the morning isn’t too foggy.

For people that have resided outside the city, you might think I’m fascinated by the slightest things, but think about it this way: I’ve lived in a place my whole life where if I looked up all I would see is sky and clouds and rims of whatever building is  nearby. So for me, being able to see beyond buildings and living in an area where it’s dark enough to have a sky full of stars is beautiful (Coldplay, anyone?)

Since last semester, I feel like I can say that, through time, I have learned to let Albany in and I am just beginning to enjoy it.  In the beginning I felt like I didn’t have an identity but after a while I realized that the world doesn’t stop turning.

Let the earth twirl around and take one twirl at a time until you’ve made a full circle around the Sun. Eventually there will be birthdays and parties and Halloween and Christmas and Thanksgiving and Yew Year’s and Fridays to look forward to and anniversaries and so on. Even if the major holidays are spent at home, eating chips and watching Netflix, it is still something to remember.

In our life we have the capability to hold thousands of memories but we don’t have the capability to know when those memories are being formed. Some of my best memories of Albany took place in university: Playing cricket behind the campus center, running from the humanities building to the LC with a burrito in my mouth and laptop open in my hands because I fell asleep before class (#college.. right?), staying in Uni long enough to see the fountains light up purple, Garba night, and the countless times I got lost on campus; and during all this I never thought once that this would be something I would be laughing with my Mum about in a few months.

Even though some mornings, right before I open my eyes I think I am in Queens, it doesn’t stop me from getting out of bed and living my day to its fullest capacity. The world doesn’t stop turning so hope on for the ride and carpe diem the homesickness away.

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About the Author:

Simonti B.
Class of 2019
Major: Intended - Biology
Blog Theme: Writing My Own Chapter 

 

 

 

Please Note: The views of our student bloggers do not necessarily reflect the views of the UAlbany Advisement Services Center. These are their stories and their voices.