do you ever look back on your life and try and figure out when you really started to understand yourself? or at least try to? i think i can nail it down to one of two 'possibles'...sort of. i think? maybe three.
when i was in elementary school (i wonder if any of you remember me talking about this a REALLY long time ago on burn it off) i was enormous pile of useless shit. the high point? i was good at math. and science. my report cards were hilarious. i'd get E's (excellent's) for everything except the 'social skills' section...because back then they actually gave a shit about their students' social lives. apparently after elementary school we don't need help with it anymore....
either way, my social skills section was full of S's (satisfactory's) and check-pluses and bullshit like that. to me, who got E's on everything (even english...but then it got hard in high school) it hurt me to see those. but i never did anything about it. i continued to chill at "the line" that we couldn't cross until recess was over watching all the other kids play soccor and swing on the swings and have dumb conversations about god knows what....oh...and i used to count (read: kill) ants. basically the line existed so that our poor teachers could have just a FEW minutes to chill out and not have to worry about a kid barging in with some dumb question they'd have to answer. it's too hard to try and change when people expect something of you...or i just don't know how to start. sooooo what i did was wait 'till i went to 'secondary school' (where DO they get these names)....7-8th grade. i went to a public elementary school and private schools after that. and this is where i think i first started to actively (as opposed to passively) caring about the big "who am i" bullshit that's plagued me for the rest of my life. i went into seventh grade telling myself i'm going to change, and the only reason i could stick with it was because nobody i'd be seeing would know i was 'changing'. they'd just be meeting the new me without ever knowing the old me.
and that was my first big change in life. up until then i think i really did do whatever i felt like. 'whatever i liked' did include what i thought would be accepted around me, of course. i didn't "feel like" terrorizing my teachers or my peers because i knew that would be frowned upon. somewhere in my development i at least realized that. where? i don't know. thinking about it now, i think i wanted to have as much fun as i could without bothering other people. i wasn't malicious or anything back then ('cause i am now) but somehow...i felt like they were better off without me in their lives. i had a few good friends. none of them lasted, though. i played baseball for seven years...but i can't remember a single time i 'hung out with the boys' unless it was after practice or after a game on the fields. i did...very few times...but it was still mostly baseball functions. birthday parties or a coaches party or something. in school i'd make friends with the kids who lived near me. i can remember only a few offhand. three to be exact. good friends...but in the end, when we didn't go to school again...we just parted our own seperate ways without a word. i wonder sometimes where they are and how they are when i pass by their houses (i just remembered a fourth good friend).
it always kind of bothered me...but the few times i actually tried halfheartedly to make something happen and approach someone to hang out...it usually turned into an embarrassing moment further supporting my usual aim to not bother people. buuuut when i left elementary school (kamiloiki elementary) and went to kamehameha for seventh grade...i decided i wanted friends. i wanted to talk to people. i wanted to learn from people. i guess my own mundane thoughts were getting boring or something. and i remember very well my first day of school at kamehameha....my first class was intermediate band...and i said hi to the first person who sat next to me...or...actually...near me. his name was alika and he ended up being my best friend for a long time...later we realized we ahd extremely different views about very basic things and although we had our fights, we remained friends. not best friends, but we were always friends. first friend i had that i could call up in twenty years and have a good conversation with. seriously, before that...it's like it's lost.
i made a few good friends and a boat load of 'acquaintences'...but i think after i made a few good friends i stopped again. i guess everyone does that to some extent (except the real social butterflies who have to be everyone's best friend...they creep me out). you find your little group, your niche, your pack, your crew...and you stop trying to branch out. i suppose there's a small backdoor open but for the most part, at some point your happy and you don't actively search for new friends or introduce yourself to a new face. and i did. i found my pack mostly in the band...6 years at kamehameha...but also in other 'geek squads' of mine (math team, physics team, chess club, economics team....). it's interesting meeting some of the poeple who were outside of my crew. all the people i didn't let into my life (or ask to be in my life) who were so interesting and i think about all they could've offered me...but i found my crew and closed off the rest of the world. a few friends were all i needed. after that i drifted into my old self doing "whatever i felt like" and basically staying out of other peoples' way. part of me thinks i couldn't handle more than a few friends. like a few friends is as far as my...base personality or inherent being is capable of handling. senior year in high school i "re-met" so many people who i'd known for SIX YEARS and realized the kinds of things i missed. haha...hell, just hearing the amount of girls who'd had crushes on me could be a life changing experience. of course i only found this out senior year...when we were all about to embark on our own bumpy journies further into the world. just one of those girls could've changed my life forever had i not pushed them away. i had one girlfriend in high school...my frist girlfriend. and SHE pushed ME away. i don't think i desired any kind of social attention from anyone in high school until her. until her...i could get it if i wanted it. which usually i didn't. after her, i started opening up more and making myself more vulnerable to see what people really thought.
towards the end of our relatinhsip i was an open book to her. i would write her letters pouring out EVERYTHING that was on my mind...pure truth...or at least whatever it was that i thought was the truth in my head back then. later, looking back, i've rethought them and realize how dumb some of them were (young!)...but at the time they were truths. and i only let the deepest ones out when i had nothing to lose. when i was convinced she was lost. when i was convinced we could never be friends again. when i was convinced she didn't want me. and you know what? it felt good. it felt good to put it out there. it felt good to force her to make a decision and stop beating around the bush. it felt good stand up and watch a bridge burn as i forced a girl who used to be one'a my best friends to light it herself. i could've let it go. i could've swallowed it. i could've done the "let's be friends" shit but it would've slowly been eating at me every moment it continued. one letter i wrote...the last letter....was do or die. she would either have to confront me and work things out...or we would forever be awkward together.
she didn't confront it. and i lost a best friend. and i grew some balls.
she found me at college through a friend and called me my freshmen year. we talked...shits and giggles. i got drunk sometime afterwards and wrote her an email telling her i didn't want to talk to her. we didn't talk for a full year 'till i finally wrote her back. emailed. much to my surprise she called me within like...an hour. she felt horrible for what she'd done to me and didn't feel like an emial justified it so she called. we spent forever apologizing back and forth about all the stupid shit we'd done...and since then every few years or so (it feels so weird to say that at only 22 years old) we'll make contact somehow...but the fact remains.
i lost a best friend.
it hurt me to think that the truth could do that. that such a simple thing as THE TRUTH could destroy something i held so dear. that someone whom i'd thought was so strong could be broken down by a simple truth. i was a very angry person after that. my friends know it. for the first time in my life i experienced being depressed. where the simple things in life which i'd usually enjoyed turned sour or bland and pure sloth seemed more enjoyable.
it came at a good time because i was presented with another opportunity to change. college.
i have to be honest with you...a lot of the last half of this blog (assuming i don't write too much more) has been a drunken 'realization' that i've just thought up that i've connected to a bigger thing (my honesty). i never considered where i developed my shamelessness...but i think it was with her. lindsay. she made me stronger. she made me harder. and...unfortunately, she made me darker. but i think the world is dark. i'm more apt to deal with the world when i take a step down and peer below the surface, take a trip through the cellar door, and explore the ideals most people are either afraid or disgusted to consider. this way...beauty is more beautiful...joy is more enjoyable.....and hate is more acceptable.
that was long.
i haven't drank this much alone in a long time.
that might be why.
open up.
