old lives

i pretty much used to be very sure about who i wanted to be when i was a kid. it's actually kind of cute, being nine and already having planned out what i'd be doing for the rest of my life. what i didn't consider, was that, eventually, i would grow up.

and i would find that "cute" is never really something you'd like to sincerely describe yourself with.

i guess what i'm really trying to say is, college sucks. okay, so maybe it's not really that bad. i'm studying something decent. i'm working on becoming someone who might be able to contibute something good and noble to the world. i'm learning things to become somebody's hero. or maybe, just maybe, i'm a big coward who cannot break away because i would never want to admit that i have wasted the last four years of my life in an education that makes sense to everyone else but me.

i have in the past, considered depression. i must say it's a beautiful word. somebody asks you if you're okay, and you can just say, "I'm not, actually. I have clinical depression." and you wouldn't even have to explain yourself. you are a diagnosis. and a diagnosis speaks for itself. but i'm past that stage. i have come to realize that i don't have clinical depression because of three things primarily:

1. i rationalize. depressed people probably just feel.
2. i still take pleasure in pleasurable activities that i have enjoyed in the past;
3. and i know exactly what i think is wrong with me.

you know how when we're kids, grownups ask us stupid questions like "What do you want to be when you grow up?" the funny thing is, more often than not, we've already figured it out. when you're a kid, there's no limit to what you can become. you can be a superhero, you can be a coat wearing detective, an astronaut, a one-eyed scientist, a witch, a doctor, a superstar dressed in sequins... you can be anyone you want to be. and nobody would dare try to tell you different.

well, i wanted to be a writer.

and i say, look how that turned out perfectly. i am twenty years old (the meaning of which i would be trying to fathom for the rest of my being twenty, until i realize that i have turned twenty-one). i am in college. i am not learning how to be a writer. i am a nag. i am your average miserable adult who has not quite figured out what to do with the oozing misery that follows me everywhere i go. and i also think misery is a beautiful word.

in an attempt to make myself, a bit more, comprehensible, i would say that i think my biggest problem is simply the fact that i am selfish. becoming a writer, would only do me good. no one would probably even want to read what i write. i won't even be good at it.

but with writing, i would be happy. i honestly think i would be happy.

but i step a bit backwards, and i look at where i am now and at what i am doing. i look at the seeming lack of freedom. the monotone. the greyness. the pain of getting up every morning. the endless rationalizing. the nagging. the countdown until it's all over. the deep breaths i take to make it all go away. i am doing something, that i am sure will make the people around me happy. and if not happy, atleast make me out as less the disappointment that i really am.

i probably will never admit this on my deathbed, but i do want to help out in any way i can. i want to be able to remind people that there should always be hope. and that if they don't see it, then maybe i can help them look for it.

i see the decency and the significance of what i am doing. i should also admit, that there have been times when i have enjoyed doing them, taken pleasure in them and have probably even told myself that this could be a good part of my life.

i have decided, that i would like to continue walking down this path. i would like to know more, and help out more. but i think that the only way i would be able to do this, would be to discover things by myself. to be away from the people who have taught me what i should know, so i can decide on what i need, and what i want to know. i want to be able to make real connections with real people. i want to be able to be free to do what i think is necessary. i want to be able to feel fearless. i want to be able to do all this, and still be me.

and i still want to be a writer. more than anything else.

but right now, i'm just tired.