belittled

I honestly don't believe there is a more suffocating feeling than being belittled, being made to feel small, and stupid and insignificant.

There is no power in crushing those around you who are not strong enough or brave enough to stand under your weight and push against it.

I think this is such a devastating emotion to feel because we spend our whole lives being told to, "Grow Up" or, "Behave Like and Adult." and we get caught up in this race against ourselves to become "Mature". Then one person swoops in with a careless string of words that chokes and destroys everything we've been conditioned to believe an associate as strong, down into piles and piles of rubble. We are suddenly stripped of this facade of strength because we were taught that Adults are strong and Children are weak. We are suddenly made to feel like a child again, a defenseless child being scolded and judged and looked down on.

Its scary to feel so small so quickly when you've grown so comfortable being strong.
Its devastating.

Most of the time its due to an innocent mistake that turned out worse than you thought. A mistake that ends in you being stepped on and squished by people who believe they are more "Adult" than you and therefore believe they hold the power to scold and hurt you.

It is in our nature to protect those who can not do so themselves yet. We look after the well being of our kids as parents, we care about the well being of our pets. We protect our younger siblings fiercely and yet we let other step on each other because we are too scared to speak up against it, "But I don't know her and she is kinda overweight, so why is it my problem?" "He is actually really weird, but hes probably used to being called that by now."

I see no courage in cutting people down. I see no power in stepping on others to "teach" them something.
I see no strength in too many adults stepping on the small to feel big.

Careless words have the ability to wrap their hands around your throat and drown you in airlessness. You would never intentionally suffocate someone, right?
"Suffocate someone? Me? NO! Never. I would never do that"
But it happens. More often than we realize.

Words without thought often end up wrapped around someones throat. Luckily  most people find a way to breathe, a way to escape the tightening tendrils before they die, but for others, it can and is a nuclear bomb going off in their backyard. Your words are so powerful than a nuclear bomb that could completely desecrate a city in less than 10 seconds, leaving toxicity and wastelands for all to find. Nuclear radiation infecting those who survive. Chemicals and monsters following people around 'till the grave. Nightmares of pain and agony seeping through the ground seeking to only poison.

Yes. Your words are more powerful than a nuclear bomb.

There is no courage in cutting people down. There is no power in stepping on others to "teach" them something. There is no strength in too many adults that belittled.

BUT

I see courage in kids who stand up for each other and push against the weight of the people looking to oppress them. I see power in the man who steps up to speak out. I see strength in those who are small and defenseless.

Good Deed To Try Out: Next time you hear someone say something careless and hurtful, stand up and protect the one receiving the pain. It may be the final squeeze that completely stops airflow. It may be the squeeze that ends a life. What have you got to lose by loosening a noose for someone else?

Think about what you want to say. Just think. 

One Day.

one day
a day will come
when we will live again.
a day when love and peace
speed past violence like a train.

one day
a day will come
when kids can be be once more
without the police or parents
protesting at their doors.

one day
a day will come
when all will have a bed
and pillows wont be concrete
for those who lay down their heads.

one day
a day will come
where war and famine are things of the past
and those who need receive
and those who want may fast.

one day
a day will come
when we love and respect
not based on skin or color
but a mutual respect.

One Day
A day will come.
A day of which I can only dream,
That will light up all the darkness
And wash away hurt like water down a stream.
This day will be a blessing,
A blessing in disguise,
For today Can be that day,
If we chose to be alive.

Written on Skin

"I'm filled with a darkness so consuming it overwhelms me and I can't breathe. My insecurities swallow me up and rip at my flesh and heart, tearing at my skin till I bleed. Maybe I'm the girl you won't ever fix." The tears pooled in her icy blue eyes as she saw her words cut into his soul. 

His heart dropped, and just like a knife being pulled from the gut, she turned and left without so much as a glance back. 

The Zing

A love so perfect, so pure that it overshadows anything else you've ever felt before. A zing comes like an epiphany. Suddenly everything around you crystallizes and you slowly blink away the dull, blurred world and open new eyes to a place so beautiful and wonderful that you have to close them just as suddenly because the sunlight is blinding.

"Two lonely bats crashed in the night...
They felt a zing, love at first sight...
They knew right then they would be husband and wife...
For a zing only happens once in your life."

Finding your zing is like reaching into a pit of shattered glass, and discovering you've grasped onto a tiny purple flower hidden deep within and although when you pull your hand out, it might be cut and bleeding but all you can see is the beauty and wonder in whats happened. In what you managed to grasp.

"Two lonely bats crashed in the night...
They felt a zing, love at first sight...
They knew right then they would be husband and wife...
For a zing only happens once in your life."

Thank you to Hotel Transylvania for this wonderful poem,

Thank you to My Zing for this wonderful feeling.

wanderlust_

She was a wanderer, shy and curious, as her footsteps, painting the sidewalk grey rang out like poetry in the night. She chased after dreams that were torn pieces of paper stuck in a cold breeze. She chased after ideas that were soft kisses on chapped lips.

2 am

2 am knows all my secrets, all my lies and all my fears.
Its filled with darkness that drowns me in the most pleasant way,
And demons that haunt me in my lonely tears.

The morning that is also night, hides its face in the shadows,
The shadows that live between the cracks and crevices of my walls,
Shadows that are more alive than the arrows
Piercing through me, ending lives and wars.

My thoughts consume me in the dead of the night.
The calm silence surrounding my still body grows icy cold,
My insecure heart is torn between hiding and taking flight.

All my walls come crashing down, in a dust cloud of surrender,
As your voice rings out through the dark,
I can feel it there, a tiny flicker, a quick glimmer of a spark,
It illuminates the fog and chases the monsters away.
It helps me remember that through every dark night,
I will be received by an even brighter day.

You are my medicine,
My antidepressant,
You are everything I need,
Because 2 am is my own reflection.

For A Girl I Know About To Be A Women

I was browsing through some poetry the other day and stumbled upon this gem.
I'd like to dedicate it to a very close friend who's experiencing a couple of her "firsts" and I just wanted to tell her this, and decided to post it here as well.

So I kinda forgot to save the name of the amazing poet who wrote this, but all props and credits and whatever else goes to him or her... Thank you for writing this. You're amazing!

Because you'll find how hard it can be
To tell which part of your body sings,
You never should dally with any young man
who does any one of the following things:

Tries to beat all the yellow lights;
Says, "Big deal!" or "So what?"
More than seven times a day;
Ignores yellow lines in a parking lot;

Carries a radar detector;
Asks what you did with another date;
Has more than seven bumper stickers;
Drinks beer early and whiskey late;

Talks on a cellular phone at lunch;
Tunes to radio talk shows;
Doesn't fasten his seat belt;
Knows more than God knows.

Wants you to change how you do your hair;
Spits in a polystyrene cup;
Doesn't use his turn signal;
Wants you to change your makeup;

Calls your parents their given names;
Doesn't know why you don't smoke;
Has dirt under his fingernails;
Makes a threat and calls it a joke;

Pushes to get you to have one more;
Seems to have trouble staying awake;
Says "Dago" and "Wop" and words like that;
Swerves the car to hit a snake;
Sits at a table wearing a hat;
Has a boneless handshake.

You're going to know soon enough
The ones who fail this little test.
Mark them off your list at once
And be very careful of all the rest.


I love you so much my SecondHalf. Remember this little test okay?

g r a v i t y

Somewhere in the distance, a dogs hollow bark sliced through the silence of a busy street. The faint sounds of cars passing by and people going about their everyday business reached the stained windows of her bedroom.

The air was bone dry, and every breath felt like it was suffocating her fragile lungs. The stale smells of life hung in the air like old coats long forgotten, and she sat there on the floor, breathing. Just breathing. Her arms were laced with delicate drops of scarlet tears, a self inflicted nightmare.  Her wrists said death, but her eyes shouted for life.

She wished she could just scream. She wished she could have found some place beautiful to get lost in, but she knew that no matter how far away she went, it would always catch up to her. Running away would not help, not today. Not on a stifling Tuesday afternoon filled with the agonizing cries of demons that she thought long buried.

The only thing keeping her here, was the devastating pull of gravity keeping her down. The funny thing about gravity, is that even when you're ready to fly, it finds a way to chain you to the ground.

Her fragile strength leaked away from her, pooling on the ground at her arm. She forced a gulp of air into her burning throat and her thoughts drifted back to everything left on her bedside table. A pen to write her story. A torn and crumpled piece of paper to listen. Her favourite book carelessly tossed open next to a small stone that glittered like the broken heart she was hiding in her chest.

She remembered all the coffee mug stains from nights spent up way past midnight and the songs on repeat that brought a melody to the darkest parts of her dusty sad soul. She saw the way the light reflected off the murky water outside and watched as it danced on her ceiling entwined with the most beautiful music she had ever heard.

Somewhere in the distance a lonely dog barked, but this time she was not there to hear it. The light had faded from the sky and the moon softly shone down on the nearly dry scarlet tears shed cried. Her wrists said death but this time her eyes agreed.

Self Harm. My Story.

I've been wanting to write about this for some time now, and well last night I relapsed.

So today I decided to sit down and just write down everything.

Okay so where to start. The beginning?
I was in Grade Seven, just turned 13. My first year as a "real" teenager, and I was ready to conquer the world. I had just been elected as The "Head Girl" of the primary school, my parents have never been so proud of me, as they were on that day.

I will never forget my Dad emailing the ENTIRE family the day it happened, as it also happened to be on his birthday, and reading all the wishes of support and pride my family had for me. It seemed like Grade Seven was going to be a fantastic year.

It was. It really was an awesome year, but I soon discovered how much was going to be expected of me, and it was a lot. I had to attend every school function, no matter how late nor if it happened on a school night. I had to deal with the pressures of being expected to be the role model for my entire school, and I learned to navigate my way through it, as we all do, I adapted.

I found ways to finish my homework during the school days, so that I could play sport after school and then go off to wherever I was needed. And it worked! It really worked for i would estimate 5 months.

And then one day I woke up and felt... different. I just felt tired. Worn out. Run down. I felt like all the colour from the world had suddenly been drained out. Everything was just so, lifeless. I remember thinking, "What the hell has actually just happened?"

I had become depressed.

Yes, only 13 years old, and I was depressed. That doesn't happen right? I was just upset? Thirteen year olds don't get depressed... Well it happened to me. Of course I still had a job to do, so I never took the time to address what I was feeling. I never stopped to ask myself if I needed help. So everyday I would get up and paint on a fake smile that would never show how I really felt inside. Dark and lifeless.

Grade Eight rolled around so quickly, and it all happened so fast... Looking back now its more of a smudge against my high school career, but all of a sudden I had to step down from power, hand over my responsibilities to someone else. What?? I had just got the hang of it! I had just figured out how to balance everything, and now my school had just pulled the rug out from underneath me, and naturally, everything I had managed to delicately balance came crashing down.

I fell deeper and deeper into my depression. I battled with my weight, and school became so much harder and everything seemed to be going wrong, but on the outside, the people that cared about me only ever saw the wonderfully bouncy happy girl they had always known.

I was so unhappy I started to feel numb. Numb to everything around me. I felt alone, scared and hopeless. It was absolutely terrifying. I wanted to cry everyday. I wanted to run away and just sit in the dark forever.

I remember the first time I heard about "Cutting" it was being covered by a documentary team and my family and I were listening to an anonymous source describe why she intentionally hurt herself. I am nearly a hundred percent sure my entire family thought about how weird and scary and completely insane that was. Inflict pain to try feel better? Everyone except me. The second after she had finished speaking, I understood exactly how she felt, I UNDERSTOOD.

I went to my room that night, and found a scissors, and took a deep breath and slowly sliced into the top of one of my fingers. Suddenly I didn't understand anymore. It hurt, and didn't make me feel better! I immediately began to regret doing it. Scolding myself internally, wondering where I could find my refund and then I noticed the blood. The scarlet liquid slowly forcing itself out of my body, out of something I did to myself... it ran down the length of my finger, and in that second I became addicted.

It sounds like a horror movie right? Being addicted to your own blood. That's some really messed up shit, but it's what happened, and soon i would find myself doing it whenever I felt numb.

My addiction to the pain developed after the first couple of times, the burning sensation as steel pulled my skin apart. The feeling of my blood running out. It was all a relief, and escape from the cold dark numbness I had been trapped inside for nearly a year.

As all addictions do, it began to grow and grow as I got braver and braver. I had started taking the blades from sharpeners and using them to slice multiple times across my arms. I had to slice more than once because otherwise they wouldn't bleed, and that's what I was looking for. Whenever I felt upset, numb or lonely I would shrink into my room, and tear myself apart.

Some people draw to express themselves, others paint or write, some may even listen to music to draw their emotions out, well in the same way that would help them, I convinced myself that cutting was the same. It took me away from everything that seemed to be crushing my airways, and let me breathe, because as long as I was feeling the pain, I knew I was alive.

Those nights are some of the darkest nights I have ever experienced. They grew in regularity, and then in length and my cuts grew in depth. Until one night I found myself cutting over cuts I had made no less tha 30 minutes ago. I wasn't afraid, I was absolutely paralyzed by the fear.

Showers were the worst, I knew I had to keep my arms clean, and every night I would let the hot water run over the incisions. Some nights I would bite down on a face cloth to stop myself from screaming out in pain. I had taken to wearing hoodies, jerseys and long sleeve tops everyday in the fear that someone would see them. I was scared to be around people, because whenever someone touched my arm, I could feel the scabs ripping open. I shied away from contact. Hugs and games and mere social interaction became a thing of distant memories. I felt more alone than I had in the beginning, but at least I had my blade. The one thing that felt real to me.

One day I decided to open up, and show my closest friends. I cornered them in the bathroom and cautiously lifted up my sleeve. I thought they would embrace me, start crying and whisper that everything was going to be okay, but I received a reaction no person should have to endure. They were disgusted. They would never admit it, but from that day, they never looked at me the same way. From that day I became a monster, a freak a suicidal girl to them. We remained friends but things were forever changed.

It got out, and the rumors spread. I would walk down the corridors and have people looking at my arms, curious to see if I had gotten to my wrists yet, curious to see how deep they were and how many. They called me names. Hurtful Ones. Told me that I shouldn't live if all I wanted to do was die.

Die? Who had said anything about dying?? That thought had never crossed my mind before.Well not until someone said that to me. Suddenly I became obsessed with the idea of suicide. My first suicidal thought. I knew it was downhill from there, but someone had cut my brakes and I was spiraling out of control. Death, blood, pain and blades began to rule over me. My every thought, emotion and action was dictated by them.
It was exhausting.

I couldn't sleep without dreaming, and I couldn't dream without dying. I would dream of ending everything with a knife drawn across tight skin, and then instead of dying, I would find myself stripped of everything but bleeding cuts before my peers. Forced to face the humiliation of them pointing and laughing and whispering about me, without being able to do anything about it. No running, no crying no nothing. I would wake up crying and shivering and drenched in freezing sweat that would burn my sores. Needless to say, I slowly stopped sleeping, slowly stopped eating... and my cutting escalated out of control. This lasted until Mid October 2009. My first and second suicide attempt soon followed and both failed, and after that I finally knew I was too far to be saved.

I was proud of my cuts and scars, I looked at them with adoration in my eyes. I was proud of what I had created. I was proud because I had finally found a way to depict the chaos that was inside me in a way that other people could see.

And then it happened. My school had phoned my mother, and told her what was happening and caught her up on what they thought the reasons were. Curtains Up and start Act Three: The worst day of my life.

Her tears weren't because of how I had dissapointed her, but instead because she was afraid of me. I could see the fear in her eyes when I showed her my arm. Hear her pain through the breathless sobs and I could  feel her urge to get out of the car and just leave and never look back at the monster that had consumed her daughter.
She took me home and told me to show my younger sister. Her and I have never spoken about it since that day, partly because I'm too much of a coward to face her and partly because we try to avoid it at all costs.
I never told my dad, I suppose my mom filled him in on everything but we never spoke about it either. Its good that we never did because I don't think I would've survived another person rejecting and being afraid of me.

My mom gave me an ultimatum that day, I either stopped effective immediately or went to a hospital for the mental unstable. I guess you can fathom which I chose.

I was clean for about three days after before I had my first relapse. It was more difficult to stop than I could have ever thought. After that I threw out every blade I had hidden, every razor within reach, and every slightly sharp object was removed from my room. For 3 months to follow I didn't even keep a scissors in my school space case.

Bravery is not the absence of fear, but rather the power to overcome it, and I owe some very important people in my life more than you could ever imagine for everything I am today is because of their decisions and bravery in the face of adversity and I can honestly admit that I am alive today because of them.

You know who you are. And I will never find a way to properly say thank you. But know you saved my life.

I have been clean for close onto 2 years, without a single incident. I slowly introduced sharpeners and scissors back into my life and was have tried to help people understand just how dangerous this is where I could. I get urges and craving but the difference now is that I know how to control them. I control my addiction, it does not control me.

The name calling at school stopped, and people are no longer afraid of me, but I know that every time we sit in assembly, and something about cutting comes up everyone's minds jump back to what I was. I can immediately feel the eyes examining my arms looking for traces and scars, and I suppose that's normal. I can see how hard my friends fight the urge to look at me as well because I know that from time to time their minds skim across those years of hardships.

And the scary thing is that I'm perfectly okay with this.

My scars, my blades and my cuts are a part of who I am. They are an essential piece of me. They make me Chay. I am proud of them today, but not because of the destruction I created but rather because they are my own reminders that I am strong enough, brave enough and human enough to get through anything life could throw my way.

I can't say that you ever "Recover" from something like depression or self harm because you don't. I fight it everyday, and I do this by waking up and looking at my arm and knowing that I am better than that. I do it by getting up and choosing to be happy. I do it by choosing life. Choosing Me. Choosing Love.

Relapse is always a tiny black fleck in the back of my mind, and unfortunately last night I did have a relapse. I cracked under pressure, and hurt myself. But today is day one of starting again. Day one of recovery and fighting for everything I had. Everything I know I am.

I am beautiful. You are too.

If you ever find yourself thinking about hurting yourself, or in a dark place that seems hopeless, know that there is love out there.

www.twloha.com
www.lifesigns.org.uk

or comment below and talk to me. xx

There is hope. It starts with you.

_when_we_dream_

"She's been dreaming again" I heard my mom whisper to my Grandma, in the kitchen when she thought I wasn't listening.
"I know, I've heard her screaming... Everyone has." She replied in a voice that was all too familiar.

I was already late for school and had missed my ride there. Again. So I had to make do with the pestering overly concerned parenting style approach my mom had planned for both my brother and I.

Her questions about my dreams were never ending and ruthless and her tone of voice was sugar coated in pity, but she bore none of the real emotion that came with it.It made me furious being stuck in this too small car, with questions that were just too big.

I was suffocating in fresh air, and so it was no surprise that when I got to school I was ready to rip someones jugular out and my first victim was heading right into the storm. My best friend Dean. She walked toward me in her causally brilliant way that made all the girls jealous and all the boys slaves.Everything just seemed to come so naturally to her. It seemed as if the universe lived to help her succeed, but 15 years of experience had taught me to know better.

"It looks like you're ready to loose your shit." she said with sudden caution, as she slowed her approach to a safe distance away and waited for my reply.
"I'm ready to do more than just that." I replied without hesitation, cutting her reply off as I started for my first class of the day. AP Chemistry.

There is just something about being told that the world is merely a chance happening and that everything we know and love and idolize is a combination of tiny microscopic atoms randomly bumping into each other, that can calm you down... close enough to death by boredom really.

The bell signaled freedom, if only for two minutes, and with Dean by my side I took this opportunity to rant about my mom and how everything she said managed to drive me completely crazy.

Later at lunch in our schools overcrowded cafeteria, I told her that my dreams had started again.
"Are they still the same ones as last time?" she softly whispered
"Have they ever been different?" my sarcasm dripping off the words like acid over silk.

Every night it was the same thing. The same dream. It would start off with me, alone in a field. There was a storm coming and the lightning behind the dark grey clouds was ominous.
I'm petrified and I start running. I don't know where I'm going and I don't know why I'm running, but I run like my life depends on it.Then I'm waking up to my own terrified screams as my eyes grow accustomed to the pale moonlit darkness of my room. The sound of footsteps rushing down the wooden corridor. A warm hand and a soothing voice softly promising I'm alright and safe and that everything was just a twisted fragment of my own tortured subconscious.

And this would happen, on a good night, two or three times. On a bad night. More than I care to remember.

The pictures and emotions that flashed through my mind were always so vivid. So real. Everything I felt was so pure that when I woke up, reality felt more like the hazy illusion of life than my dreams had been.

Sleeping for less than 3 hours every night might have been the reason I was always so impossible and why I found living so hard to do. These dreams also created the innate fear of the dark inside me, because when the dark only promised horrors, how could you love it?

I wished everyday that I would just fade into everything surrounding me. I felt like I was being suffocated by the walls in my classes, the doors of my moms car, the clothes clinging to my body in the hot summers air.
I felt trapped. I felt like I was stuck in an eternity of being a tiny little ant in a glass container, following long tunnels that lead to no where.

Every road, tunnel, bridge, stairway and journey always had a start and an end. A reason it was put there. To span a gap or allow for transport. So what was I doing here. I felt like everyday of my life was being compressed into one long tunnel of memories that were full of darkness and blurs, that I was trying to crawl through, and somehow I just knew it didn't end anywhere significant not anywhere worth writing about.

A bridge had more purpose than my life, but here I was, a little ant, crawling through a never ending narrow tunnel. One that just seemed to overpower me. A tunnel that was dark and cold.









"Sammy. Snap out of it!" It was Deans shrill and obviously irritated voice, that had pulled me out of my day dreams.
"Sorry, I guess I'm just distracted."
"Wow, either those dreams are really bad or that guy across the cafeteria has really caught your attention. Go say hi!" I was being dragged across the twelve meter room before I even knew what was happening, and suddenly, he was there.

"Hi Dean. Sammy." His words were just as effortless as he was.
Oh God. I felt my blood rushing up to my cheeks, and the sweat starting to form in the palms of my hands. I could hear my heart beating against the veins in my neck. The blood struggling to get free of it's restraints. It was the only thing keeping me from falling over, until his piercing voice broke my focus and reminded me that I hadn't replied to whatever I was being asked.

"Yes. I do." I blurted it out, without even thinking and regretted it the second it happened. I could see that, that might not have been the most appropriate response for whatever he'd said, by looking at Deans face of disbelief and the tiny hint of poison that crept into her response directed towards me. I really couldn't pay attention to whatever it was because I was mesmerized by the tiny twinkle of curiosity that lived in Denmarkos' eyes.

It was a hint of magic in a forest of dark green. A forest I was now hopelessly lost in. My fantasies were soon interrupted by the bell. Home time. Oh the joys.

Dean invited me over for the afternoon, which meant an invitation to the most beautiful house where, just like her, everything was opulent and over the top. Waist high, white marble counters sparkling in the glimmer of the crystal chandelier, greeted me with winks of light and glimpses of the most delicious looking pastries mankind could ever hope for.

Her whole family seemed to be decedents from Aphrodite and Zeus and I bet people would always wonder about how we had become such good friends although we were so different. Her being the envy of every teenage girl, skinny, outspoken and drop dead gorgeous, ad me being the weird, dark punk girl with poor taste in hair products... well people don't always understand that Dean and I share more than just fashion secrets.

 and the fact that Dean still chose to remain single was a myth all on its own. I had heard the speil enough times to be able to recite it by heart.
"I am a powerful women, and I don't need the opinions of some little boy defining me. I define myself and thats blah blah blah." I usually stopped listening somewhere around there.

Everything Left Unsaid

I don't understand why your doing this to yourself. To us.
It scares me.
It's not healthy.
Please stop, I love you.

Your not happy? But every time I see you your smiling...
Huh?
They did what to you?
How didn't I see those marks on your arms? They're so obvious. They're so red.
Please, I love you, stop.

How can you feel alone in a crowded room?
How can you feel so lone when I love you so much?
I don't understand how...
Why didn't you come to me? Tell me? Speak to me.
I would've listened, I promise.

Numb? I sometimes feel numb as well...
Why wouldn't you tell me about all this earlier?
Darkness... Inside...of...you?
I could have shown you how light in the world was.

How did I miss the broken soul beneath that mask?
It's my fault.
I could have done more.



Please, I just need you to hold me tonight.
I'm scared.
I don't want to do this, but I can't stop.
Its consuming me.

I think I've forgotten how to be happy.
He stole it away from me.
So now I hide it so deep inside me, even I cant find it.
I love you too.

Is it cold in here?
I think I need my jersey.
The one with the long sleeves.
Yes, that one. Please don't ask me to ever take it off.

I don't want to feel anymore.
Every time I do, it just hurts.
Its inside me. Creeping through my veins like a disease.
There was nothing you could have done.
Its not your fault.
Please don't blame yourself for everything I did to myself.

I just want you to remember that
I really did love you.
But I couldn't wait forever.
I loved you then, and now...
All I see is red.

I Wont be Seventeen Forever

Seventeen is a place that I could only describe as... well rocky to say the least.

I have been tasked with the responsibilities of being an adult but I find myself a year away from all the perks.Well five months to be exact, and more so this year, I have discovered how challenging teenage life is.

Between school, family and friends, I still have to find time to fit in a part time job, sport, healthy eating and study time and trying to achieve that balance is not always that simple. Life has a funny way of throwing the most unexpected variables into our equations and be sure they don't always make things easier to understand.

It's always as soon as I think I've finally got enough time to breathe, that I suddenly find myself being dragged back underwater, or in my case, under piles and piles of notes and worksheets.
Some days it honestly just feels like my life is being dictated by font size 11 words trying to enlighten me about the kidney and scientific formulas trying to get me to discover that the terminal velocity of any object will be constant.

The only thing that ever feels constant these days is the feeling that everything I do this year will define who I am forever. Its scary to think that this is my last year of high school. To think that next year I will have to say goodbye to my friends, and that we might never see each other again as our lives take us in completely different directions.

These 9 girls have really changed my life and helped create the person I am today. If ever there have been problems, and trust me there have been plenty, from boys to misunderstandings among friends, I have always known that if ever I found myself alone in my dark room sobbing my eyes out every single one of them would be there with ice cream and alcohol before my tears could make my mascara run. I know I have at least 4-6 moms that I have no biological connections with, but that love and treat me like their own daughter, and its all thanks to these amazing young women that, dare I say it, have become my sister and companions for life.

Although this year presented a unique set of challenges it also brought with it plenty of nights I wont ever forget. Concerts like Rihanna, Justin Bieber, Swedish House Mafia and more filled my year with music and memories. Movie nights and birthday sleepovers that ended up becoming utter chaos as nine girls ran rampant, high on sugar and caffeine, in nothing but skimpy pajamas and slippers will never be forgotten. You can always be sure that with these girls your night will be a raging success if you have Mean Girls and Bridesmaids, and endless supply of tea, and enough cupcakes to put Carlos Bakery to shame.

I don't believe that I will never ever see these creatures that ensure my life is always overflowing with girl talk and endless gossip again, because it would take the Earths oblivion to ever tear us apart.

Our break time conversations have evolved from envy over each others barbies to how gross boys were to how edible they've become to the latest gossip about that girl at the party and now to university plans. It's scary to think that, what feels like yesterday, I was thinking how long the last 6 years of my school career were going to take, and now I only have 425 days left until they ask me to stop coming to school.

How ironic is it that for 13 years they beg and force you to come to school every single day and then suddenly, as if your final year were a disease that you've now caught, it all changes and they start to politely tell you that you can't hang around anymore because your scaring the little kids.

Seventeen has been a year full of ups and downs, some downs that nearly hit the core of the Earth and some ups that lead me to believe I was partly eagle and could fly. I can remember thinking to myself last year December that 2014 was going to be a year to remember. I looked at the calendar and discovered it was already October and I had still done nothing that would set this year apart from the others. I swear it was April less than a minute ago?

I must say though, this year has taught me one thing, and that's that life is like trying to build a house of cards, outside, in a public park. There are guaranteed to be obstacles like joggers and old ladies, and sudden gusts of wind that threaten to blow everything over, but once you've completed your masterpiece, everyone passing by will stop and stare and think to themselves, " How on Earth did (s)he manage to build something so wonderfully delicate in such a harsh environment?!" And it will be your turn to take a step away and say, "This was all me.'

2014 has been a year of love, life and learners licences. Substantial developments in my life have lead me to believe that with love comes heartbreak and the two will always be paired together. I also discovered that I am a human practically incapable of "moving slowly." Whether I'm out jogging in the evenings or trying to navigate the rough seas of relationships, long and short distance, I always find myself sprinting at top speeds and then suddenly coming to an abrupt halt as I run out of stamina and breath to continue and so I'm left standing there wheezing and red in the face.

Am I too young to love? Too young to understand the complexities of what the word entails? I am constantly surrounded by those who are posed on opposite sides of the spectrum, those who believe with every fiber of their being that love exists and can be found in even the smallest place, and those who are dead set against everything teenage love represents and believe that we are incapable of the depth needed to feel these emotions.

Emotions have played a huge part in this year for me and have lead me to make both rash and rational decisions that  in the end have ultimately worked out for the better, although not all of the time.
Some advice I can offer is that all highs are only temporary and that lows are determined by your own resilience.

Teenage Memoirs

The most common question I have been asked is, "What are you going to do one day?"
Well, lets just say it's... interesting.

I'm still trying to figure out exactly how this all works. School, Friends, Boys and well Life. Its a delicate scale that has to be balanced perfectly in order to work out...

Some days I wake up, just happy to be alive, and content to live and be exactly who I am, and other days its a little more difficult...

My exams have started and although I get days off to study at home, I still feel as if I'm drowning in little black words printed next to grey and white microscopic diagrams. Sure, it seems as if I'm working hard in my room, but really I'm just staring at words moving my eyes from left to right across the page, trying to comprehend concepts that seem to be floating past my brain and getting stuck while being absorbed.

I also cant escape the fact that these exams will pretty much define the rest of my life... every adult I've spoken to, keeps telling me about how important this grade is, and asking me what I want to do when "I'm Grown Up"

First they'll tell me do something you love, and then in the same breath they turn around and tell me that money is everything, and that all they see in my future is success beyond my wildest dreams, as long as I'm willing to do something that I kind of want to but don't really... and make all these sacrifices in order to be wealthy.

If you really knew what I wanted to do, I would tell you I wanted to do everything, I want to be on stage, acting, singing and dancing... I want to be playing hockey everyday, pushing my body to it's limits. I would want to be learning how to make the piano obey my fingers at every stroke, I want to travel the world and discover each religion and culture and meet the locals, live like them and make friends all over the world. I want to be scuba diving... exploring the depths of the ocean, chasing tides and turtles and then I also want to make tons of money so that when I want, I can take a roadtrip down to the oceans shore and bathe in some sun. I want to come back up and work on an artificial chlorophyll that could sustain rural settlements and create fresh water and glucose that could be manufactured into food and given to these people and that could help sustain them, and win a Nobel Peace Prize for this reason. If I could do anything I wanted I would be painting and drawing and creating music with all my international friends in foreign countries studying biochemistry and biotechnology while being able to sing for people who wanted to hear my voice fill up the air and still find myself having time to relax with some really nice boy and maybe one day settling down somewhere breathtakingly beautiful.

"What do you want to be when you grow up?" "What are you going to study when you leave school?"

Please don't ask me those questions, my own dreams and expectations scare me, they truly frighten me. To think that I have no idea what or who I am...That I don't really know what makes me most happy and most excited, is a concept I'm still trying to figure out.

I look at my peers and ask them the same troubling questions that I can not yet answer and some have a very clear idea, but the others are just as confused as I am. Its scary having to make these decisions that will one day define you.

Life is but a mere balancing act, a delicate art form only a few every master.

What do I want to be when I grow up....

Happy.

9200 Miles

"I love you..." she softly whispered into a dark, cold room.
A room illuminated by an alien blue light, that reflected the reckless dreams in her eyes, the love struck emotions in her mind.

Her mind is not her own as the idea of him consumes the flames in her soul, his voice occupies more than a few mumbled words as it moves through her veins, like a disease she never wants to cure.

Her body may be lying still on a bed as hard as heartbreak, but her eyes are filled with daydreams corrupted by blissful happiness and promises of a life shes always wanted. Golden streaks of life delicately threaded between ideas of love and lust, a place only he could ever take her.

Her innocence belongs to him, as they both promise a life of forever after to each other. With eyes wide open, the silence is deafening but it speaks a million words only they will ever know.
Words that will mean more to her than the very air she breathes through corrupted lungs soaked with pain and loneliness, but tonight he will set her free with everything he is.

Even though her surroundings are cold, she is comforted as he softly replies, "I love you more..." his words hanging in the air above her lips. Lips that long for his breath. She longs for a touch, a brush of skin, just a simple spark to start her heart again.

She looks at him through eyes that have cried salt and listens to him with ears that have endured hate, but in that moment, the very Earth beneath her seems to disappear and everything that is bright and lovely seeps into her skin and all she can manage is a beaming smile.

"What are you smiling about." His words are tainted with love...
"You" her words are carried away on a breath caught on a breeze.

She could stare at him for forever and never tire, but his smile is all it takes to make her muscles seize  and cause her soul to illuminate. His smile is all it takes to chase away all the shadows hiding under her bed, and the demons lurking a step behind her.

Her clock says 2:45 am but her eyes can see the sunlight streaming in through his window. It's the same light that will greet her cold skin in a few more hours, and it's something that her soul delights in. A million questions swarm to mind but she settles for a simple, "How was your day?"

The only thing better than goodnight kisses transported across a world that seems so small, yet stretches for an eternity, are his cute messages that never fail to light up her face with a smile and whisk her away to thoughts of him.

She wishes she could make people understand how her young heart has finally found something it could hold onto. When she tries her words escape her delicate lips and become impish whisps that dance around the air, refusing to be tamed. How could she ever describe in words something so pure and beautiful traded by two hearts when she didn't quite understand it herself.

In the never ending night that plays host to darkness, she is more comforted by a boy a million miles away, then by her favorite teddy bear, clutched tightly against her chest.
And even though they are separated by an ocean, she can always find him a whisper away.
9200 miles.

A Whiter Shade

My fingertips are numb. Numb and frozen, slowly turning a darker shade of purple with every minute that passes.

All I have with me are my thoughts, my memories and myself. I'm alone, with everything that I am. Nothing else matters anymore.

Its cold out here, but I hardly seem to notice. All I can focus on is the soft whispers of your voice, fading in and out of my war plagued mind. Your voice echos when I hear it, but is followed by a silence so heartbreaking, it would rip any soul into shreds. Any soul that wasn't already broken. Any soul but mine.

My heart feels as though its been ripped into shreds by the sharpest claws. Tattered pieces of cloth, hopelessly holding on by starved threads, grasping onto one another as though they were the last fibers of matter. The last pieces of life I could still posses.

When you left me, I felt so... Why did you go?

Why did you leave me alone, with this broken piece of flimsy life beating me black and blue from the inside out. I'm breathing but I feel dead. I'm feeling but inside I'm completely numb.

I'm sitting out here so that, if even for just a little bit, in a while, I can feel the same way I do outside as I do on the inside. The wind is licking at my cheeks like a hungry dog. I'm sure they're blood red by now. My lips feel as though they should be a whiter shade of the snow that is slowly falling from the dark sky. A whiter shade of death.

If heaven is in the sky, then why does the sky look like hell? The clouds are black and thick, and as far as I can see it looks as though the smoke from a the tormenting fires of hell have filled the air, and my lungs, and poisoned the beautiful blue horizon, and turned it grey and black. Grey. And. Black.

Grey and black seems to be everywhere, in my dreams, my heart, my thoughts. Everywhere.

If that's what heaven looks likes, even sometimes, why did you leave me?

You've always been the person I've needed the most, and now that your not at home to give me hugs, who else is going to be able to make me feel as safe as you did? Who else will be able to bring me even the slightest slithers of sunlight.

I just don't understand how you could have left. You know what I'm like. Only you understood how to help me when everything was getting worse. When the days were becoming colder and darker, outside and inside of me.



Its blinding white outside. But the snows gone, there's nothing on the ground.
The wind is so cold, I'm surprised those tall trees aren't moving at all...
Those clouds that were poisoning your heaven are also stealing the sunlight, but everywhere I look, it seems to be so bright.

How could you just let me leave, all alone.

Why didn't you fight harder so that I could stay, if even for just one more day.

Why did you let me die?
Why did you let me die?





Written for a friend who's Daddy has to go away for a while. I wrote this for her because I want her to know that I know what it feels like, and that I love and support her. Keep Staying Strong and Beautiful.

He'll be home soon. iloveyou.

Sparcsi

"Its not always like this, you know" she said with silent tears fading into her pale white skin, "Its just, some nights it feels like I'm the only person in the whole world. It's so lonely in my mind. It's so lonely and dark and cold... and some nights I just wish I had someone else to help fill up this vacum of thought sucking everything up inside me."

I remember looking into her eyes, I saw every colour of her emotions. I could see a million shades of blue swirling around a brilliant blood red streak, as if they were completely engulfed in this intricate dance. I could see yellows and greens daintily weaving their way through this abstract painting, and beautiful glistening pearly whites. Polka dots of a soft pale pink flecked like dust against a soul scorching black canvas.

I had never felt this way about someone before. The way he was looking at me reminded me of those soppy romance movies where the "out-of-my-league" boy always ended up, head over heels in love with the "mysteriously-heartbroken-girl"

I used to dream about the moment someone would look at me and decide I was worth that storybook moment when time stopped and all that you could see was that persons love, when it felt as though your heart might burst out of your chest and just run forever hand in hand with him in sheer bliss leaving behind a shell of a person, delicate enough to be swept over by even the slightest breeze. A shell that would travel with the wind forever, floating like a piece of white cotton among the dandelions in the sky.

And here I am, now, standing in front of him, confessing everything. spilling out the very essence of my soul, I was opening the curtains on the deepest darkest parts of me that I thought I would never tell anyone. Those pieces of me, even I wasn't sure about. His eyes were illuminating all the pieces of me, and I always thought this moment I exposed myself, would be the most liberating few minutes of my life, but instead my muscles were paralyzed with the fear of rejection, my own voice seemed detached from my body and muffled as I listened to it pour on about every inch of my fears and dreams, how I was self conscious about my legs and how I thought I had dazzling sapphire coloured eyes, I swear I caught a faint glimpse of an," I also think I'm pretty good at painting" thrown in there somewhere. 

It was dark outside, and the windows were cloudy from the icy breeze running through the trees, doodling on them. I've never heard any person say some of the things that she did that night. She was so brave and strong as she spilled out everything to me. I felt like a book with a thousand blank pages being filled up with a beautiful handwritten story with her name gold embossed on the cover, she was the most beautiful person I've ever seen. as the dark brown wicker beside lamp drew delicate shadows on the walls and against her cheek she seemed so luminescent. Her skin seemed to glow in that small room, it light up a piece of my heart in a way she always managed to do and I nearly missed it that night because of how numb I had become to it, but that night it was just... different.

The wind outside sounds like a violin as it forces It's way in through the cracks of my window pane... the sound of his breath is the only other sound that fills the room, and together they create a catastrophic duet. His voice keeping time like the solid beating of a drum, while the wind screams it's emotions to the world. My eyelids begin to close as his rhythmic breathing becomes the only figment of reality keeping me from drifting off into the depths of my dreams, where hazy blues and grey's beckon to me, and in the midst of them, a blurry figure begins to take shape. It looks like I'm staring at it through eyes that have just been crying... the tears blurring any real details from view. I can make out intricate details closer to me, the sharpness of the figures is a little shocking at first as my eyes slowly adjust to the landscape. Everything begins to seep into perfect clarity, I can hear the ocean behind me, murmuring into the sand loyally, but can't turn to see it. All I can do is stand and stare helplessly at a breathtakingly expansive landscape, a kaleidoscope of colour fills my eyes, and suddenly I feel something electrify my skin. I look down and see a hand grasp mine, the touch suddenly jolts tiny tingles up my back and my palms begin to sweat. I hear my name whispered, and turn my head to locate the owner of the angelic voice, and it's him.

My heart stops for a split second and my breath catches in my throat, my senses are overwhelmed as the brightest white light suddenly envelops everything around me... including him. The only reassurance I have that he is still with me is his satin soft grip on my now clammy hand, and then, as if on cue, he floats the words," I love you" in my direction, and this time, every fiber of my being, every inch of my soul and every emotion screams out that, for once in my short life, I truly believe every word his lips have pronounced, and my heart sinks into itself with exhaustion as every wall of mine comes crashing down. I am held together by a thread so delicate the softest hint of a breeze would tear it, and me, apart.

Drowned

in a sea of hopelessness
im gasping for a breath
lifeboats in my mind
are lying motionless

echos of my thoughts
drown out my crashing tears
falling to the rocks below
im engulfed in all my fears

the though of loving you
is like the salt inside my lungs
drowning in my sorrow
to the rhythmic waves of drums

im freezing in bitter cold
and you just dont seem to care
its taken everything i am
to see you everywhere

im drowning in my emotions
an uncontrollable storm
im stuck in an endless ocean
of love struck romantic notions

in an ocean of icy woes
in gasping for my breath
lifeboats floating close
will finally rescue me.

The Ancient Language

" Atra esterni ono thelduin.
Mor'ranr lifa unin hjarta onr.
Un du evarinya ono varda."

"May good fortune rule over you.
Peace live in your heart,
And the stars watch over you."

                                             - Inheritance from the Eragon book series.
                                                      Christopher Paolini

Unmasked Circus

Welcome Ladies and Gentleman,
To the Circus of the Strange;
The sideshow of the Sinister;
And the theater of the Bizarre.

Enter a realm of dark wonders,

To indulge in your wickedest dreams-

Or, if you dare,

Explore the shadows of the most diabolical nightmares,

Cast your eyes,

Among the cruel oddities of nature

And behold monstrous creatures from the depths of the abyss.

Follow with awe and dismay,

As you witness unbelivable death defying acts,

That balance on the brink of doom.

Leave the mundane world behind,

For those who visit this festival of phantasms,

Are never the same again.

Step this way,,

There's no turning back.

How amazing would it be to produce a play about this piece? Imagine the creepy characters lurking in the shadows, a cruel ringleader, and a delicate tightrope walker.

Costumes full of black tutu's and peacock feathers,  deep red latex suits with blood dripping from the strongman's' lips.

Definitely adding this play to a list of things to do,, i can see it now!

Spotlight Please!

"Quote" "Unquote"

         http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xGrNhTDlDY - defiantly worth it...

"The tragedy of life is not death, its what we let die inside of us while we live." - Chay

"If i live the life I'm given like I'm supposed to, I wont be afraid of death, but in fact I will look forward to it because I have done everything I've ever wanted to." 

"The sky is not the limit, Its the view." 

"The roots of art, live in joy." 

 "The only way to brighten the darkness, is to bring our own lights and let them shine." 

 "Courage does not always roar, sometimes its that little voice at the end of the day saying, 'I will try again tomorrow.'" - Anonymous

 "Sparisci" - Chay

"Somehow I feel there's more to life than what were promised. We just have to find it." 

"I don't know what to say" he said
"It's okay," she replied. "I know what we are - and and I know what we're not" - Lang Leav

I've never heard silence quite so loud.

But you don't understand how much I cried.

Your way to young to be this broken darling.

Found this the other day and it just got me thinking about what life really was, do we live to die or is there something more?




I just need some beautiful place to clear my head.

By loving me, your teaching me how to love myself.

The sad souls are always up past midnight.

Colours of thought.

And I saw every colour dancing in your eyes.

I saw my emotions bleeding out in every beautiful word you spoke.

My thoughts became a whirlpool of lyrics as every idea of you touched my rainbow stained soul.

And with that, your heart beat faded into a summer breeze, and danced away towards the ocean.

I was gone.