Me Being A Stranger

Jadi gini. Sejak saya kecil, somehow, saya selalu ngerasa, saya ‘beda’ dari orang lain di sekitar saya. Saya lebih suka membaca. Tenggelam dalam buku-buku saya daripada maen di luar seperti temen-temen saya yang lain. Memilih jurusan kuliah pun, dulu banyak yang menyayangkan keputusan saya untuk memilih MIPA Kimia. Banyak yang bilang bahwa seharusnya saya masuk Kedokteran (Oh plis, tolong ya, saya dan Biologi gak pernah akur). Atau masuk Teknik Sipil aja, seperti ayah saya. Saya masuk UGM pun, beberapa orang masih ada aja yang berkomentar soal ngapain sih saya mesti jauh-jauh kuliah ke kota yang sama sekali asing bagi saya.
And somehow, itu terus berlanjut. Saya sekolah lagi. Selesai sekolah, balik ke kampus tempat saya ngajar. Bosen ditumpukin kerjaan birokratif, saya ngajuin aplikasi beasiswa. And here I am now, sekolah lagi.

The thing is, not so many people from my high school do the same thing as I am doing now. Most of them are living the ‘normal’ life. Lulus SMA – kuliah – lulus- kerja – kawin – having kids – posting picture of their kids in Facebook.
And so on.
Well, I’m happy for them. They seem to be happy with their life.

The thing is, they start questioning my life.
Kok belum kawin?
Kok sekolah lagi?
Jauh amat sekolahnya?
All those social pressure. Pffttt…

Some of the questions and comments even come to the point of making me uncomfortable.
Kok ke Amerika? Susah lho disana. Cewek ngapain sih sekolah tinggi-tinggi? Kan sama aja sekolah disini sama di luar negeri.
Lately I don’t even bother to answer those kind of questions. But at least I still manage to make myself smile as the only answer I care to give them.
Trus, ceritanya temen-temen SMA seangkatan saya bikin grup WA. Which is actually nice. It’s always nice to hear things from some old friends that you haven’t met for a while. Apalagi saya semenjak kuliah, jaraaaangggg banget ketemu temen-temen SMA.

Tapi entahlah. Reading their chats, their jokes… I just feel… Different. Like a square peg in a round hole.
I don’t find their jokes to be funny. I can’t relate to their conversations. I find some of their so-called idealism is the opposite of mine.
And somehow I feel like I am an outsider. Watching them go on with their lives from a window.
I don’t feel like I belong there anymore. And I don’t even know whether I want to be one of them.

But I guess, that is just another thing about this life that I need to find out. To find a place where I belong.