My Writing

I used to play guitar (as you can see). A real guitar, too, not just a tennis racket. I wrote before that, then started playing and taking lessons from a friend of a friend. After a while, I became bored and stopped getting better (my hands are small, so my reach was pathetic and painful), so I stopped. After that, I started writing again.

That was about a year ago. At the time, I figured that I stopped playing guitar because there were so many kids my age and younger around me who could play pretty much any song, and who had been performing for live audiences for years (a couple even had CDs made). So, is the only reason I write because there isn't anyone around me who is ten times better? Maybe if I was friends with Michael Collins or something, I would feel like crap about my own writing, and I would stop. Or would I want to work harder to get closer to his level? It unsettles me to know that it would probably be the former. What will happen when I start college, and I begin working in the journalism program? If there are writers there who are better and more experienced than I am, then will I stop writing? How am I ever going to have a career if I keep becoming intimidated like that?

And yet, this pleases me, because I've found something to work on about myself. Maybe this will help: I promise to never completely stop writing for any reason. We'll have to see what the future brings.

My Epiphany of Life

At last, I have ascended. Hah! Even in the final moments among the many Below, they frowned upon me, they scorned my presence, they deemed me, ME, a traitor to the Below because I craved ascension. And now I’ve gained it, and they hate me for it! O, how their blood boils in its veins, how their mighty anger must blind their vision and play tricks on their minds! I, the traitor, have been invited to the place above you all! The ruthless tactics of a traitor have showed themselves useful this day. They never saw it coming. The sly word in to an Above, the tender misplacement of an important document, they never saw me plotting and planning behind it all! Not me!

But what’s this? Even as I gaze down at the tender, dull Below from my perch in the Above, I can hear a call, a call resounding throughout the Above causing my new equals to move, to work, work harder than my forgotten friends Below, harder even than I worked to ascend to this level! What makes them move thusly, as though the devil was behind them chasing them out of the depths of hell? Must I move this way?Yes, I feel it in my bones; I feel the call to which I must answer. How may I serve the call?

Yes, I see. It is the above of the above. It is the towering end of my journeys! The Top swallows us up; it uses our strength to its end. How may I serve you?! How may I become you? I understand now. The Below, it is nothing. To perch in the Above and glare at the below is suicide! The Top must be my goal. I will be a traitor to the Above. But I will be the Top in the end.

My Insomnia

I'm afraid of disappointing people. With some of my friends -- Andrea, Michelle (when we were friends), etc -- this isn't a problem because they express their discontent immediately when I do something wrong. It makes me fearless around them; hanging out with Andrea is the most comfortable thing in the world. On the other hand, people like me -- Leah, Derek, Jessica, etc -- terrify me, because they hide it when their upset (usually for my sake). So when I borrow money from Leah for lunch or something, I spent the entire rest of the day wondering if she was really willing to give it to me, or was I just so pushy about it that she had no choice? Or when I go home early when it's slow in the deli and leave Jessica to close, I stay up in bed wondering if when she told me I could go, if she was actually hoping I'd stay and keep her company. Sometimes, I tune in to my own feelings when I do something like that (telling a person they can leave when I really want the company), and I know that it really isn't a big deal. But it feels so huge to me.

The biggest problem with this is that I am a very confident person; my friends even used to call me arrogant and egotistical. I wanted to stop being so sensitive, because I realized how much I overreacted to small things. Now, I have one side of myself telling me to leave the deli as soon as possible, and another side punching me in the stomach as hard as it can, and telling me not to leave Jessica alone just because I'm bored. The former wins, but the latter catches up later. Like now, when I can't sleep because I'm wondering if the reason she was so compliant was that she wanted me to decide to stay.

Gah, I hope the arrogance wins out, because late at night, when the Mountain Dew wears off and I'm really tired, the fear comes back to punch me in the stomach some more, as hard as it can over and over until I have to get up out of bed and rant about it.

My Decision

About four months ago, I officially broke up with my best friend. She had been taken in by the fear of life because of graduation, plus almost getting pregnant, and it was too much for her. She pulled her friends in tightly, wouldn't let us breathe. She stopped listening to what I said; she used to say I was a good friend for telling her the truth, but she no longer wanted to hear the truth. She held equal expectations of everyone, even if we couldn't live up to those expectations. She was never alone, always had to have someone beside her. She began telling people that honesty was her greatest attribute, but she used it without empathy. So one day, during my birthday party that she forgot to attend, she invited me and my friends over to talk. She attacked you in front of me and Leah, and I attacked back for you. I told her everything I needed to, and she still refused to hear. I begged her, crying, to listen to me and not blame me for what was about to happen, but she wouldn't listen. So I told her I wouldn't be her friend.

I don't hate you, but I hate hypocrites. You talked about Michelle, how horrible she was, how stupid she was for not listening to me, for not seeing what was right in front of her face. You agreed with me that it was ridiculous to be so upset about every small thing that happened just because there were no big things to be upset about. And then, you started poking and prodding at me, saying rude things. "I'm just happy to finally see you fail." It rang so true that I cried on the drive home. You started telling me outright that you blamed me for the bad things that happened to you, you told me that you thought I was dishonest, manipulative, and unfeeling simply because I didn't have feelings for you. You said this all as if it were nothing, and God forbid you notice how it upset me and try to talk to me about it. No, because it's all about you. You never had any intention of being my friend. You just want to get laid. Every friend you have is a girl because they're potential girlfriends. You're just "lonely," and no one understands.

You began taking small things I said, and calling them betrayals. I betrayed many times because of something I said or didn't say, no matter what the reasons. The fact that I didn't even know you thought they were wrong until sometimes weeks later when I finally approached you about it didn't seem to bother you. As long as I failed once again, in anything, even our "friendship."

It sounds familiar. One person finding tiny things to be angry at another over. You're doing the same thing Michelle did. So I'll respond in the same way. I don't want to be friends with you. I don't mind seeing you, talking to you at work, but why would I hang out with a person who fights me at every turn, and only wants to see me fall in my face, even if it's only in the person's mind? I'll tell you one thing, though; this was easier than it was with Michelle. I knew her since kindergarten, and I was best friends with her for six years. I sobbed when I broke it off with her, and I had nightmares for months afterwards. I wrote like crazy about everything, about how I felt, and I still didn't have the guts to talk to her in the hallways, because I was afraid she'd pull me back in again. But with you, well, you pushed me away without pulling me back. I've only known you a year, and we only spent a few months of that as friends. Then it was all about you getting a girlfriend.

You almost had me that night in the truck when you explained exactly why we would be good together. Sometimes logic isn't enough. It used to make me so angry that you blamed me for it not working out between us, because I wasn't trying. Think about it Ken; you were trying to convince me! You were in love with me, how in the world was it my job to make it work?

Well, anyway, I hope this all makes sense to you. Like I said, I don't hate you, and I don't mind talking to you at work as long as you don't attack me, which is what usually ends up happening. I won't be a mediator between you and Andrea; if you have a problem with someone ask them about it. Stop asking yourself why you are so lonely and no one understands you, and start asking them. Just sit down for a moment. Don't do to Kirsten or Amanda what you did to me, because I guarentee, while it might grant you a short while of attention, they won't stick around so long as I did.