I got back to campus two Sundays ago, and since then, it’s been meetings stacked on meetings, speeches, handshakes, deadlines, and noise. So much noise. Everyone wants a minute, a thought, a presence. And I keep giving and giving until I feel like I’m dissolving into the rush.

I miss silence.

I miss hearing my thoughts instead of the sound of people talking over each other. At home, the quiet used to hold me. I could think. I could write. I could feel. Here, the air hums with interruptions — laughter, music I didn’t choose, arguments about nothing, the endless chatter of people who never seem to tire.

And then tonight, I snapped.

I lashed out at my roommates and some friends.
The words came hot, faster than I could stop them. And it felt—God help me—it felt good. Like an exhale I’d been saving for months. Bitter, but clean. The kind of release that burns on the way out and still feels like oxygen.

I’ve always been the calm one. The one who says, “It’s fine. No wahala” Who prays instead of confronting. Who forgives before feeling. But this time, I didn’t. I let it spill.
And when the silence after came, it was guilt. Guilt and, underneath it, something like relief.

They say hardship reveals your strength. I think it shows your fractures.
The parts you’ve disguised under titles, competence, and a soft voice. The short temper. The impatience. The ambition that’s just a little too sharp. The lack of empathy that you keep excusing as exhaustion.

I know words shape reality. I shouldn’t call myself these things, lest they become truer. But what’s the point of pretending I’m fine when I’m not? What’s the point of masking the mess when it’s already leaking through the cracks?

Maybe this is the real prayer: not the tidy ones we say before bed, but the broken ones that sound like help.
I think holiness isn’t the absence of anger, but the return after it.

So tonight, I’m not fixing it.
I’m just sitting in it. The noise, the guilt, the hum of campus life that won’t shut up.

It’s 23:23. I’m tired, hollow, and still somehow grateful.
Because even here, in the middle of my mess, I know God still listens.