darkSpyro

It's finished, guys! The full story starts below! Enjoy!


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I was born in the wee hours of December 29, 1996, in the small town of Dublin, Georgia, United States. My mother and father were not married; they had actually been divorced for four years at that point, and never remarried. Please don't ask me how they managed to conceive me at such a strange time, for I do not know, nor do I care much to know. Their relationship was strained due to my mother's drug addiction, which combined with my father's anger management issues to write the perfect recipe for a dysfunctional family. I was my mother's only child, and my father's third, but the only one whom he actually raised.

Our house was, and is, far outside of the city limits in the middle of nowhere. We're surrounded by forest, and our closest neighbor is half a mile away. Our isolation was rather unfortunate, for because of that and my lack of siblings, I never saw other children on a regular basis until I started school. Naturally, this led to some poor social skills, but we'll get to that later.

It was here in the early years that I developed what would become the boldest idiosyncrasy of my childhood: a strange eating disorder which I suspect is SED, but I've never been diagnosed. For those of you who don't know, Selective Eating Disorder, or SED, is when a person can only eat foods in a limited "comfort zone," typically about 10-15 items. If SED sufferers try to eat anything else, they'll retch, gag, and eventually vomit. Because research into the disorder is relatively new, there is no known cause or cure. Surprisingly, there doesn't seem to be many health issues associated with the disorder, as there are 60+ year old adults who've simply lived with it their whole lives and turned out fine. But I digress.

Based on accounts from family members, I had no issues with eating until I was about three years old. Then, for reasons still debated to this day, I suddenly couldn't tolerate many things that weren't peanut butter sandwiches, French fries, or spaghetti. I could eat other junk food easily, such as chips, cookies, and other sweets, but when I tried to eat other "real food," it would come right back up. My parents didn't think much of it because they assumed I would eventually grow out of it. However, when I was 11 years old and still had made little progress, they decided to solve the problem their way: forcing me to eat whatever they put in front of me. It was a long, painful process, but I did expand my taste buds exponentially, and today I would say I've pretty much beaten it. I still make weird faces when eating new foods sometimes, but that's really the only remnant of it. It's been years since I've actually thrown up because of it. From what I've read, I've made exceptional progress when compared to the average SED sufferer, which makes me think it might not be SED after all. But as I said, I've never been diagnosed, and since I now have no reason to, I suppose I'll never know.

However, this wasn't my only health problem. My parents were hardcore smokers for the first 15 years of my life. They always smoked inside the house, too. Therefore, when I started school, I was immediately defined as the weird kid who smelled like cigarettes and brought peanut butter sandwiches for lunch everyday. Funnily enough, because I had gone so noseblind to them, I didn't even know what cigarettes smelled like until my parents finally quit.

My early school days weren't a total nightmare, though; all of my teachers noted and lauded my above-average intelligence. At six years old, I could spell "elephant" and I wanted to be a cardiologist. Now, the former could've simply been an offshoot of my affection for the gentle giants, and to this day they're one of my favorite animals, and the latter was due to my maternal grandmother's death from a heart attack. In fact, I'd say my grandmother was the greatest cause of my academic success; while my mother was working as a dialysis technician, and my father was roaming the woods for deer or turkey, I would spend the days at her house, whereupon she would constantly buy me educational toys and games, and placed me in front of the TV to watch PBS Kids. She was a magnificent woman. I wish she could've lingered a little longer, so I could know her better.

Unfortunately, the golden stars on my papers and the honor roll bearing my name could only do so much. As it normally does with children like me, it became less of an achievement and more of an expectation in the eyes of my parents. So let me give you a more complete picture of myself as an early primary school student; I was a socially awkward, academically achieving, cigarette-scented boy who ate the same thing every day. Let's throw in the facts that I was unusually short and skinny for my age, as my growth was stunted by either secondhand smoke, a less-than-nutritious diet, or a combination of both, that I was into Godzilla, Spyro, Harry Potter, and other quintessentially "nerdy" pastimes, and that I was incompetent and uninterested in any form of athletics. So, it's hopefully not difficult to see why I was the target of some not-so-friendly schoolmates.

The bullying started out small, with the usual taunts and rhymes. However, it eventually escalated to the point where they would throw in a barb at every opportunity, do whatever it took to ruin my day. By the time I was in 5th grade, I was getting physically slammed around on a daily basis. I tried fighting back, and I even won a few times, but it never ended. It just made them angrier. I mentioned earlier that my father is an avid hunter; because of this, I've been around guns all my life. I was taught how to use a firearm before I was taught how to ride a bike without training wheels, and I like to think I'm a slightly above-average marksman. Therefore, put two and two together and it's easy to see why I was seeing the school counselor every other week.

Concurrently, a few years after I entered grade school, my mother relapsed, which led to the loss of her well-paying job and what little stability our family had. Things got pretty bad. I remember more than a few times I witnessed my dad putting his hands on her. Eventually, they separated, with my mother moving back into my late grandmother's house. In short, I had problems at school and I had problems at home. My only escapes were books, dogs, and the few true friends I had.

I would spend alternating weeks with my parents; one with my mom, the next with my dad, over and over. This wasn't the easiest time for any of us; they constantly competed for my affection, each of them trying to turn me against the other. My mom would tell me of my dad's undying resentment of her, which was certainly true, and my dad would tell me of how she wasn't really clean and that she was selling all of my games and toys to buy drugs, which I didn't want to believe at the time, but to which she later admitted.

Eventually, my mom sold my grandmother's house, and moved into a trailer park with a childhood friend of hers. Let's call him Travis.

Now, everything about this was horrible: my mom was unemployed, the neighborhood was filled with sketchy white trash, and we were on welfare. But the absolute worst part was Travis. He was rude, crude, drunken, disgusting, and downright disrespectful. He was helping us pay the bills with money from an unknown source, which was later revealed to be drug dealing. He bullied me just like the kids at school; he once threw a glass ashtray that missed my head by inches, and I remember pulling a knife on him. It was a butter knife, but it's the thought that counts, I suppose.

Finally, one fateful day while Travis was passed out, my dad called and said he was coming to get us. This was when I was ten, during fifth grade. We were going to finally be together again, all under the same roof. Our problems were finally over. Wishful thinking on my part, I suppose. The worst of our problems as a family were over, true, but we had a long way to go. I still had a long way to go.

I'm doing a series of posts due to character limit.


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The next year is when I started middle school, probably the most....unusual.....period of my life. During these years, I did something I had never attempted before; I actually tried to be cool. I thought that maybe if I began to act like all the other kids, the bullying would finally cease. If you can't beat them, join them, right? Well, I was less than successful. The average American middle school student is a strange breed indeed: lost in the merry melodies of Lil Wayne and captivated by the screams and shouts of crudely recorded street fights on World Star Hip Hop. I even spoke in ebonics for quite some time, which I'm sure gave any onlookers quite a chuckle.

In this curious realm into which I'd stepped, you see, trivial matters such as homework, tests, and quizzes become devoid of any meaning. Who needs to be a good student when you have street cred? I stopped caring about my grades, just letting fall what may when it came to my academic work, and the results became apparent. For the first time ever, I found myself actually failing classes; before, if I even made a high B, my parents would go ballistic. You can imagine how they reacted to these incidents, then. While I always managed to pull my grade up by the end of the year and fortunately never had to repeat a grade, I had become a shadow of my old academic self. This change of attitude also poisoned my personality; I was incredibly disrespectful to my teachers, even found myself outright hating them, which I'd never dreamed I'd even think of doing. I still feel ashamed of that to this day.

Also in middle school is when my dad's anger management seriously became an issue. For the smallest mistake or disagreement, he'd fly off the handle, and I'd get an earful of curses and empty threats. The threats were always empty, but at the time I wasn't so sure, for his theatrics rivaled even those of Blackbeard. I recall one incident where I didn't like a pair of shoes he had bought me, and he threatened to kick me out of the house. This temper continued on into my high school years, where we finally realized it wasn't just a temper, but we'll come back to that later.

At this point, it's easy to see why middle school wasn't the greatest improvement over elementary school for me. However, this is also when I found a new safe haven for whatever tomfoolery I'd concocted, the Pandora's box that brings us here today: the Internet. See, for me, the Internet was the red light district on the edge of town, frequented by the down-on-their-luck salarymen and the self-hating white collars. And my favorite brothel? You guessed it: darkSpyro. I've been here in one form or another since early 2009. But to avoid compromising far more interesting details, I think I'll omit most of what went on here. Let's just say I once considered this site a virtual home away from home, and now it's just a place I go to when I'm bored. But I'm still here, so I can't bash it too much, I suppose.

Early middle school is also when I went through a Christian phase, due to my paternal grandmother's passing. I had never really believed as a child, and deep down I still didn't, but I wanted to. So after her death, I began attending church regularly and quoting the Bible in any remotely uncertain situation. I wanted acceptance: not social acceptance, but the acceptance of knowing I could be a good person. In a Bible Belt town like Dublin, you pretty much have to be a Christian to be seen as any semblance of a human being. However, I couldn't continue lying to myself, and so I stopped. Shortly afterwards, I came out to my parents as an atheist. They didn't think much of it, as they weren't exactly practicing Christians themselves. Today, almost everyone who knows me knows, and I'm happy with that.

During this period of time, my new persona took its toll on my relationships, specifically that with my best friend from as long as I can remember; let's call him Jason. Jason and I used to get along to no end, due to our shared nerdy interests, but in these few years, the way I began to act alienated him. He knew he was dealing with a different person, and I suspect this stressed him out. Oh, we were still great friends, but we argued often. Tears came. Insults came. Threats came. But they never seemed to leave. Not inside of us, anyway. Eventually, Jason moved. We stayed in contact for a little while, but it fell off. I haven't really spoken to him for some time; he did show up to my high school graduation as a surprise, but that was the last time I saw him. I'm hesitant to reach out, because I heard that his family recently got into a spot of legal trouble. I figure if he wanted me to know, he would've told me himself. But I don't know. I miss him.

I'm jumping all over the place, forgive me. Let's get back to middle school, specifically eighth grade. By this time, I was still immature, ignorant, and defiant with no cause. And this is, by no coincidence, I suspect, when life decided to teach me one of the hardest lessons I've ever learned. This is when I got my first real girlfriend; let's call her Madison. Because of Madison, my life got flipped, turned upside down. I was just chilling out, maxing, relaxing, all cooling.....Okay, I'll stop now. But this was big.

Madison, like many other girls I met, was a self-proclaimed emo. She cut herself and threw out the occasional suicidal remark. For some reason, I always seemed to end up with these girls. I've been criticized for always finding girls whose lives are plagued with these problems, but the way I see it, I don't find them; they find me. Anyway, Madison was, at age 13, no longer a virgin. This was a red flag for me, who had barely kissed a girl and had given no thought whatsoever to sex, but I went through with it anyway.

It got to the point where I was in love with her. I would've done anything for her, and I told her so on a daily basis. However, we were never really consistent; we were on and off for about four years, but the longest time we were actually together was about 2-3 weeks. Every time she left, she left for another guy. These guys were always the same; 2-6 years older than her, barely getting by in school, clad in dusty baseball caps and worn out camouflage jackets, with a sizable knot of tobacco in one cheek. And I know it's bad to generalize, but sometimes you're right; none of these phantasms treated her quite the way she wanted, and so she'd always come back to me in the end, promising things would be better, and I'd fall for it every single time. I remember once she made out with Jason right in front of me. I remember another time she told me she loved me and had sex with a random guy at a party the very next day. I always thought those guys were legitimately better than me, that I was doing something wrong, that it was my fault I was failing. I know I sound very bitter, but it's hard not to when I spent so much time, effort, and emotion trying to make her happy and build something, and she always cast me away. Eventually, she had a baby, which seemed to make things worse; two weeks ago, I had to call 911 on her because she actually attempted suicide. They got to her in time and hopefully she's getting help.

Madison, therefore, was the main reason middle school ended worse than it had begun for me. Perhaps because of this, I failed to change. So I went from eighth grade to my freshman year of high school, carrying this apathetic persona with me for most of the way. However, at the beginning of high school, I made probably the most important decision of that part of my life; I joined JROTC. If you don't know what that is, please Google it, for I'm not going to waste any more characters. You see, I had wanted to join the military for quite some time, as do many millennials who grew up in the wake of 9/11, but retribution and patriotism were only small parts of my motivation. What really inspired me was Harry Potter. I'm being serious now, bear with me; those books taught me all about facing fears, finding inner strength, challenging yourself, and standing up to evil. And that's how I interpreted it to my own life.

Anyway, JROTC was the first and foremost of my activities in high school; looking back now, it's easy to see why I took so quickly to it. It was filled with misguided souls, some who took it seriously, and others not. I was pretty good at it, too; while freshman year was not largely noteworthy because of some lingering middle school immaturity, I became a cadet officer sophomore year, which is rare, and by junior year, I was commander of the whole unit, which is almost unheard of. While at the end of the day, we were still high school kids and nobody had any real power, it still felt nice to be able to lead and teach my peers. Even though most of them were just dead weight, the overwhelming majority of them respected and even liked me, and to me, that made it all worthwhile.

However, while I stood for something at school, there was still the challenge at home: my father. His temper had reduced him to a monster in these years. Before, his outbursts and tantrums occurred only a few times a year; now, it was every other day. I remember once I didn't have a sharpened pencil to do my homework, and used a pen instead. His reaction was to smash my Xbox and tell me that I was never going to be anything. That was his favorite remark: the smallest mistake, and I was told how I was going to be a failure. I remember how he'd go outside and stare endlessly into the distance, with a certain expression on his face. It wasn't sadness, or anger, or distress, but......Defeat. Hopelessness. Pain. Not the intense pain that comes with isolated incidents, but the dull, resounding pain of drowning in an abyss of your own creation. Every now and then, he'd say how nothing felt real to him anymore, that he thought he was going to die soon, that my mom and I were making him miserable with our inability to live up to his standards. It was at this point we all knew something was seriously wrong, but it wasn't until my senior year that we finally convinced him to see a doctor. He was diagnosed with clinical depression, and has taken medication for it ever since. He's improved tenfold, but he'll never truly be rid of it.

My sophomore year saw my triumphant return to my former self; I began to excel academically again, a winning streak I maintained for the remainder of high school and on into uni, as previously mentioned I had begun to shine in JROTC, and all of this boosted my confidence to a level which no one had seen in years. And this is also, during one of my longer off periods with Madison, when I met the second in my list of significant significant others. And no, that wasn't a typo. Let's call her Karen.

I don't know what I noticed first about Karen. It could've been her blue hair. It could've been her Blink 182 T-shirt. It could've been the long, red scars on her wrists that I tried so hard to ignore. But I was drawn to her. And it was clear she was interested in me, as well. We admitted our feelings on the very second night we talked; this was also the same night I stayed up until 2:30 AM talking her out of suicide.

deep


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My time with Karen was turbulent, to say the least. Every other night, I would be doing that again. She would go on and on about the futility of her life, and I would feebly try to convince her to stay in this world. And every other night, I would get closer to failing. It was all leading up to the one night I finally failed and she attempted it. Apparently, she had taken some pills until she passed out. Her mother found her that night and took her to the ER, and for the next week, she was held at a mental hospital in another city. We broke up a few weeks later, for unrelated reasons. But we'll get to that soon enough; as for now, I want to give you a clearer picture of who Karen was.

Now, many factors contributed to Karen's instability. There was nothing anyone could have done for her at that point. However, there was a central, driving force behind her utter lack of will to survive, and it was what that force sought after that would keep her alive, she claimed. Karen made it clear after a while that she wanted something from me, something I couldn't and wouldn't give to her. At this point, it sounds like I'm talking about sex, but no, that wasn't it. It was the product of sex: another human life. A baby.

You see, when Karen was 12 years old, she had her first pregnancy, which ended in a miscarriage. She never recovered from the pain, as most victims do not, but it absolutely destroyed her. She was so young herself, and her cruel upbringing led her to believe that to create another life, one that would ceaselessly depend on her love and return it without fail, was the only way to salvage her own. Her father was abusive, her mother was a drug addict, and family "friends" sexually exploited her from early childhood. She never knew true happiness before, and when she lost that baby, she would never know it again. So she took out her distress on her own body, determined to end her life unless that black hole could be filled.

The entire time we were together, Karen had a "friend." Let's call him Darren.

Darren was about two years older than her, one year older than me, and he had three things I didn't: money, a car, and endless free time. He spent more time with her than I did. The way she looked at him was unlike the way she ever looked at me. I was so stupid not to see it before. Well, that's not exactly true; I saw it very clearly, I just chose to ignore it. Chose to tell myself I was wrong. Chose to endure this misery only to see her happy. You know, it wouldn't have been so bad if he cared the way I did. Listened to her the way I did. Sacrificed himself the way I did. But it's not a perfect world. I put my soul into her. All he put into her was his anatomy.

Finally, I got tired of it and broke up with her. I just couldn't take it anymore. She stayed with him, and eventually, she got her wish; she gave birth to a baby girl about a year later. Now, I'd like to tell you that there's a happy ending to this after all, that Darren did the right thing and stayed with Karen and the baby, proving himself as a man and a father, and that Karen finally recovered from this intangible disease. Wishful thinking, though. They put the baby up for adoption, from what I hear Karen didn't have a choice in the matter, and shortly after she was gone, so was Darren. It took no time at all for him to move on to the next chick. Meanwhile, Karen is right back where she started: alone, childless, and broken. A little while later, she moved to a different city, where she's been living more or less decently. Darren is still in town, apparently doing nothing with his life. I, for one, am not surprised.

Before I close the Karen Saga, I mentioned earlier how she allegedly attempted suicide when we were together, right? Well, if you've been paying attention, you'll know that my mother used to work in the medical field. My mom had a friend who was working in the ER that fateful night, and according to the friend, a teenage girl came in as a result of a supposed drug overdose.

Her tox screen came back negative.

*Sending you all of my love*

Towards the end of sophomore year, I had begun to move on. And this will be the last part about a girl, I promise.....Okay, that's a lie. It's the last long part about a girl, at least.

It was towards the end of sophomore year when I set my sights on who would become my star-crossed Polaris. Let's call her Maria.

I had known Maria since elementary school. In second grade, she chased me around the playground, trying to put makeup on me. In fourth grade, during one of our little activities in the gifted program where we were to pair up and interview one another, she got all of the basic info of my life and delivered it so beautifully, I could've given her a Pulitzer right there. In sixth grade, I got in trouble for "hitting" her when she annoyed me; it was just a clap on the shoulder, I'm not Chris Brown, I swear. In ninth grade, we squared off at a local writing competition; unsurprisingly, she defeated me. Karma, I suppose. And now in tenth grade, I was suddenly struggling to speak to her. She had been up there on gifted kid's pedestal with me throughout elementary school, but unlike me, she didn't fall from grace in middle school. Her winning streak never really ended. I thought I had absolutely no chance with her; this was a girl who had seen me as the crying, cowering wimp in elementary school, and as the apathetic, absent-minded idiot in middle school. How could she have any respect for me, knowing my past?

I'll tell you how; it's because she was like me. Maria was a broken-homed bookworm and relentless Potterhead, too. Her mom was an addict like mine, and her dad was madder than a bull elephant in musth. However, her parents' story didn't end quite as fortunately as mine. They never reunited, and her dad never recovered from his mad spell. Out of respect for her, let's leave it at that. Anyway, I recall many times that Maria came to school with a red, tear-stained face. Every time I saw this face, even long before I began to have feelings for her, I longed to wrap my arms around her and tell her that it was okay, that their world never deserved her smile anyway. Maybe I loved her all along. Who knows?

What I do know is that, regardless of my optimism or lack thereof, I couldn't ignore my feelings. I had to at least try. So I did. And I had no idea into what I was getting myself, but I loved it. We spent many a night talking about everything under the sun and beyond it, everything from life to death to damnation, everything we knew and didn't know, and everything we felt and resisted. However, my pessimism about our chances got the best of me. I was getting the impression that I was bothering her, that she wasn't into me as I was into her, and that I was wasting my time and hers. So, that summer, I just stopped talking to her.

I done goofed.

In a few months' time, she contacted me again. She went absolutely nuts, stating how I'd abandoned her and how she doubted everything about me. I just feebly defended myself against her words, even though they were true. Not by intention, but by result. After her rage, it was my turn to get the silent treatment. This was the first of many of our fights, and though it did get pretty bad at some points, I'd say this was the worst. It took a while for me to get out of the doghouse each time, but when I did, it was like it had never happened. The soul searching, the music exchanging, the plan making, it would all resume right where we left off. Yet every time I hinted at my feelings and the possibility of us being together, she would dodge it and completely shut down. I didn't always make the smartest decisions with her. Sometimes I was insensitive. Sometimes I was impulsive. Sometimes I was incompetent. But through all the harsh words and high winds, she was there. And every time we gave each other the silent treatment, she was always the first to return. That's how I knew that she felt the same way. Long before she admitted it, deep down, I knew. And that's why I never gave up.

It was during one of our big fights that I confessed. I just couldn't hold it in anymore. It was time to finally get her to feel what I'd been feeling for the past year. No surprise to her, she said; she had known all along. Not very shocking to me, as I'm not the stealthiest guy in the world. However, shortly before that occurred, I had written her a poem. It was the first, and to date only, poem I'd written that wasn't for school. Strange what love makes a man do. I gave it to her after I confessed, on Valentine's Day of our junior year if memory serves me well. It was the first evening of the following March when we finally sealed the deal with a kiss, in her car, under the amber light of a streetlamp in a grocery store parking lot, listening to "Ocean Avenue" by Yellowcard. Romantic, right?

We kissed anywhere and everywhere after that. In the school rotunda. In our AP U.S. History teacher's classroom. In her car after school. In the busy doorway. In the crowded hallway. We didn't care who saw. We were writing our song all over the streets of our childhood. We made sure everyone knew. The month and some change that we were together was no question the most uniquely beautiful period of my life. However, thus quoth Fuel, all that shimmers in this world is sure to fade.

See, before we were together, another guy asked Maria to prom. Since I wasn't going to prom that year because of financial issues, she said yes. I had no problem with this and still didn't when we got together. What kind of blowhard would I be if I forced her to go back on plans she had already made? Still, everyone's a journalist in a small town, and so I found myself frequently asked about this by our peers. One of them was a girl notorious for pathological lying and delusional wandering, her name etched into conversational tapestry across the halls. Drama queen? She was a drama empress. Let's call her Becky.

Anyway, Becky asked me how I felt about this ordeal. I gave her the same answer I gave the others: "It's fine with me." However, unlike the others, who merely left it at that, Becky kept pushing: "But she's your girlfriend. How can you be okay with it?" I responded that I trusted her and that it was of no great importance. I knew she was goading me, so I chose my words very carefully, knowing she couldn't make anything if I didn't give her anything. I was wrong. Heaven help me, I was wrong.

*Sits down and listens intently*

*Lies on stomach and holds up head with hands*


Gee, you live on cray cray life Metallo!

Becky was a family friend of the guy who was taking Maria to prom. Apparently, Becky told his mom something, his mom told Maria's stepmom, and the next thing I know, Maria's begging me what I said to the guy, because her stepmom's about to call the police on me for threatening him. Naturally, I'm freaked out and enraged by all this. Becky was trying to ruin our relationship and my good name for no apparent reason other than to watch some sparks fly. To this day, I still don't know exactly what she said, but it must've been serious, because it changed Maria's parents' opinion of me forever.

Maria's stepmother was already semi-abusive to her, and it was plain to see that she dominated Maria's dad, who had known me since I was a little boy and who I hoped would never believe such an outlandish tale. From that day forward, her stepmother swore I was the Devil himself, and apparently convinced the rest of her family as much. Maria even hinted that she wanted to kill me if she could get away with it. It was one of the factors that contributed to our breakup.

After a few weeks, Maria had grown listless and distant. Something was bothering her, and I begged her to talk to me, but she kept ignoring me. I had no idea what was going on or what I could do about it. It felt like my whole world was crashing around me. Finally, she ended it; I had seen it coming, of course, but it hurt all the same. I blamed myself. I thought - no, I knew - that I had done something wrong and she wouldn't tell me what. However, this wasn't the end for us. After quite some time, our cycle began again; while we were never officially together again, we resumed our midnight conversations, our fights, our silent treatments, and our reconciliation. Occasionally, we admitted feelings for each other, yet I still never knew why we couldn't try again, or why it even ended in the first place. When she finally told me, I was shocked, to say the least. Well, maybe not shocked.....Just disappointed.

She told me that it had gotten to the point where her stepmother would threaten to kick her out of the house if she continued talking to me, where she would check Maria's phone bill to see who she was texting, where she would have something to say every time my name came up anywhere. She also said that my faith, or lack thereof, was a huge problem, as Maria is a devout Christian; on occasion in the early days, she would entertain my heretical challenges and thus prompt philosophical debate, but after visiting some sort of youth revival camp the summer between our junior and senior year, she refused to pay my views on religion any heed. Looking back on it now, this does make the most sense; how the hell could we get married and raise children in two different worlds?

There was another theory that I had, that she denied at first, but partially admitted much later; it was that her dysfunctional family had made her run from love, for fear that she might share the fate of her parents. I knew this because I felt the same way. But I'm just not the kind of guy to take counsel from fear.....Or common sense, for that matter. And I learned my hard lessons over and over, and I still learn them because of it. If this is true, I hope she finds someone from a good family, someone who isn't......like me.

Anyway, we continued to talk throughout senior year and the first semester of university. We didn't go to the same uni, so it proved a little challenging at times, but we stayed in contact and shared our new worlds. Then, only a few months ago, we fell off. Friends who talk to her said she outright decided to cut me out of her life. I have no idea why, and since then, I've been desperately trying to reach her, but she's been ignoring me, and everyone I send to reach her. So I'm just going to let her be and give it time. Maybe she'll come back, maybe she won't. All I know is that I can't put my life on hold for her. But I hope she comes back. I really do.

*Nibbles on popcorn*

Before I continue any further chronologically, I'd like to share a few anecdotes from some of the golden times, and how they affected me.

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I believe I previously mentioned how much I love elephants. The first time I ever saw one in person was a trip to the circus when I was around three or four. However, I don't remember it much; I was a bit too busy crying, as this was also the first time I saw a clown in person. Call it coulrophobia, I suppose, but they freak me out and I want nothing to do with them. Therefore, I'll describe my first memory of seeing elephants and actually enjoying it; it was a second grade field trip to Zoo Atlanta. My mom was a chaperone, and she spent the entire bus ride keeping my bouncing, babbling self in check. My excitement rattled around inside my stomach, where the butterflies danced in anticipation of meeting my four-legged heroes. The bus had hardly parked in front of the gate when I darted off to the African Plains exhibit, the hand-painted wooden arrows guiding me to my beastly idols, and when I saw the empty enclosure, the butterflies fell dead to the floor. Were it not for my mother's threats of reddening my bottom in front of all my teachers and friends, I would've broken down and cried right there. I can't remember whether it was her or zoo staff who told me that the elephants had only gone in for a bath and assured me they would be available later, but it was that promise that kept me from breaking into the reptile house and unleashing the snakes upon them all.

In the meantime, I tried my best to enjoy the trip, and I did; the other animals certainly kept me entertained, especially the gorillas. If you've ever been to Zoo Atlanta, you know that their main selling point is the gorilla exhibit. I remember one fat fellow who sat and ate bamboo right at the glass wall, unfazed by the children gazing and gesturing at him, like the flies and mosquitoes at which he must've been so accustomed to swatting. In the background, some babies swung on tires and rope hung specifically for them, while their mothers sat watching nearby, seeming to communicate in a strikingly similar fashion to the manner in which Southern ladies love to gossip. Unlike their circus counterparts, zoo animals do not perform, for they amaze the audience by living mundanely. It was displays such as these, combined with my persistent ownership of dogs throughout my life, which forged my ardent belief that animals and humans are the same souls in different bodies. I believe the amazement a zoogoer experiences when he lays eyes on a foreign beast stems not from difference, but from similarity. After all, "a touch of nature makes the whole world kin." Brownie points if you can tell me who said that - without using Google!

I remember I was enjoying a Happy Meal at the zoo's built-in McDonald's - Atlanta has everything, I tell you - having nearly forgotten about the elephants, when one of my classmates heralded dreadful news; the bus was going to leave in an hour. Once again, I led my mom on a frantic chase to the point where this journey had begun. She hurried along behind me, telling me not to get my hopes up and to prepare myself for disappointment. After what seemed like hours, my eyes found the enclosure wall, looked downward, and there they were: three beautiful, powerful females, sipping from the small pond that served as their watering hole, and raising their wizened eyes to meet the gaze of the onlookers, to meet my own gaze. Few times since then have I felt so honored, so empowered, so fulfilled. Our visit lasted only a few minutes, as we were all supposed to meet up and visit the gift shop before departing, but it felt like years. I could've boarded a plane to Kenya and spent the rest of my life roaming the Serengeti with those divine creatures and no one could tell me otherwise. I wondered why the zoo had only females; I learned many years later that most zoos do this because bulls become too dangerous and unpredictable during the mating season, when most of them catch musth.

At the gift shop, I bought a plastic lion, a rubber glow-in-the-dark elephant, and a fact book on elephants. While its pages revealed eye-catching information to the casual elephant admirer, such as how much hay and alfalfa the average bull consumes in a day, it was at first of little interest to a connoisseur like me. However, as I delved further, it focused less on numbers such as tons and gallons, and more on numbers such as populations and birth rates. This was the first I heard that elephants all around the world were in critical peril from poaching and urbanization, and that if we didn't intervene, they could become extinct within the century. Thus ignited the first flames of belligerent activism in me; I continued my daydreams of the Serengeti, but this time with my dad's guns, to show the poachers that two can play at the hunting game.

This is a streak from which I've never recovered; I dreamed of travelling back in time to Southern plantations, opening the gates at night and letting the slaves run free, while waving Massa's head on a pike; I dreamed of roaming the streets of Alabama in the 1960s, blasting the police with firehoses while the dogs tore their faces asunder; I dreamed of storming the Reichstag with my own personal army as concentration camps across Europe collapsed, with Hitler pleading for his life at my feet; I dreamed of kicking down the doors of abusive husbands and fathers, escorting women and children to safety as these monsters lay dead in the wake of my justice. Basically, wherever there was injustice, I dreamed of stomping it out. I loved having a cause, for it gave me identity, and power. When I was fighting for freedom, I was no longer the kid who was pushed around by everyone he met, but a man, a warrior capable of saving the world. Now, of course, I know that the world isn't so simple, and what's right can never be determined without careful thought, examination, and context. Still, I find it hard to make decisions using logic, one of my many flaws that I'll just have to amend with time.

And to think I came to all of this from a simple trip to the zoo.

(bump?, i hope this doesn't get mm'd)

He's still thinking it through, Metallo likes to make sure everything is perfect before he posts it.

Quote: ThefirstNapkin

He's still thinking it through, Metallo likes to make sure everything is perfect before he posts it.

^ I understand, I just wanna make sure it stays at least on the second page, so it's not lost to the influx of topics.

I appreciate it, Paris. :) Here's another little story before we get back to the action.

-----------------------------------------------------

When I was in eighth grade, my immature attitude combined with my ever-slipping grades aroused the ire of my parents, as it arguably should, but back then I didn't want to admit it. So I made my escapes. One late weekend night while I was seeking shelter in that intangible hugbox we call the Internet, I came across what I maintain today is the main driving force in my writing style.

You see, I was on YouTube, drowning my unrighteous angst into the classical rebellious troubadours: Blink 182, Three Days Grace, Linkin Park, and Breaking Benjamin to name a few. Suddenly my eyes found this red thumbnail with white lyrics faintly visible: "You're the flash of light on a burial shroud." I know I had heard that somewhere, so it interested me. According to the video title, the song was "Jumper" by some band called Third Eye Blind. Once again, this was faintly familiar to me, so I clicked on it, more out of curiosity than anything, and instantly I heard those same words I had heard countless times through radio static:

"I wish you would step back from that ledge, my friend."

Now, I'm not suicidal and I never have been, but I have known many people who are, or more accurately, were. Besides, just something about those lyrics seems to soothe the restless soul, a reassuring touch upon the trembling shoulder of youthful revolution. When Jumper played, I felt myself jumping, jumping out of reality into a pool of seemingly false confidence. That's what an onlooker might say, anyway. But nothing was false about this journey; in this world, no one criticized me, no one broke me down; instead I was built back up, empowered, well-armed against the demons I had to face back in the "real world." And just like that, I felt better. When the song ended, I was back in my chair, in front of my computer, in my little house in the woods, exactly as I had left it. But it was different; now, I was ready to face the world. Unlike those aforementioned middle school favorites, who only told you to be angry and distraught, Third Eye Blind taught me how to deal with that arduous adolescence. And keep in mind, this was all from one song.

So naturally, I dived a little deeper. I discovered two more dust-collecting tracks from my childhood, "Semi-Charmed Life" and "Never Let You Go," which revived my nostalgia for the early 2000s, the days of Wonderballs and Bloonies and plastic dinosaurs and other corporate madness I don't care to recall at this point. From here, I kept descending into that beautiful gorge, and it all seemed to fit in perfectly with me; my 3EB playlist on YouTube now has more than 40 songs. The sharp guitar riffs and fluid drum beats pleased my ears and led me to catch myself subtly swaying along more than a few times, but what pleased my mind were the lyrics. If you've ever listened to 3EB, you know exactly what I'm talking about here. Essentially an English teacher's wet dream, they're bursting at the seams with metaphor and imagery, and describe lovably relatable situations. Despite the overall bright sound, some of the lyrics are dark and even morose, but this is what resonates with the fanbase; it's music that doesn't tell any fairy tales. It presents reality to us, but in such a manner that creates sympathy and synergy, and the simple fact that it exists in this presentation style gives hope to the Misfits, as we like to call ourselves, that we aren't alone on this world. We use it to break our hearts and open our eyes.

To this day, I value music as the ultimate form of expressive art, and while I can't learn a chord or carry a tune to save my life, I use it to tell people how I really feel. Music is, in my experience, the best cure for a case of the blues, the quickest way to a woman's heart, and the optimum medium for celebration; it is a jet, a ship, and a train with a round trip ticket and no destination; it tore apart the Iron Curtain, proving itself as a unifier of mankind. All of this I firmly believe, and all of it started with one band.

Just this past March, ThefirstNapkin and I went to our first concert ever. Guess who it was?

I guess you can say our Third Eyes can finally see.

I just want you to know that I have read every word of this and will continue to do such.

I'm the same, it's really interesting. Hope you can do more, Metallo!

No problem, Metallo.

Quote: Metallo

I appreciate it, Paris. Here's another little story before we get back to the action.

-----------------------------------------------------

When I was in eighth grade, my immature attitude combined with my ever-slipping grades aroused the ire of my parents, as it arguably should, but back then I didn't want to admit it. So I made my escapes. One late weekend night while I was seeking shelter in that intangible hugbox we call the Internet, I came across what I maintain today is the main driving force in my writing style.

You see, I was on YouTube, drowning my unrighteous angst into the classical rebellious troubadours: Blink 182, Three Days Grace, Linkin Park, and Breaking Benjamin to name a few. Suddenly my eyes found this red thumbnail with white lyrics faintly visible: "You're the flash of light on a burial shroud." I know I had heard that somewhere, so it interested me. According to the video title, the song was "Jumper" by some band called Third Eye Blind. Once again, this was faintly familiar to me, so I clicked on it, more out of curiosity than anything, and instantly I heard those same words I had heard countless times through radio static:

"I wish you would step back from that ledge, my friend."

Now, I'm not suicidal and I never have been, but I have known many people who are, or more accurately, were. Besides, just something about those lyrics seems to soothe the restless soul, a reassuring touch upon the trembling shoulder of youthful revolution. When Jumper played, I felt myself jumping, jumping out of reality into a pool of seemingly false confidence. That's what an onlooker might say, anyway. But nothing was false about this journey; in this world, no one criticized me, no one broke me down; instead I was built back up, empowered, well-armed against the demons I had to face back in the "real world." And just like that, I felt better. When the song ended, I was back in my chair, in front of my computer, in my little house in the woods, exactly as I had left it. But it was different; now, I was ready to face the world. Unlike those aforementioned middle school favorites, who only told you to be angry and distraught, Third Eye Blind taught me how to deal with that arduous adolescence. And keep in mind, this was all from one song.

So naturally, I dived a little deeper. I discovered two more dust-collecting tracks from my childhood, "Semi-Charmed Life" and "Never Let You Go," which revived my nostalgia for the early 2000s, the days of Wonderballs and Bloonies and plastic dinosaurs and other corporate madness I don't care to recall at this point. From here, I kept descending into that beautiful gorge, and it all seemed to fit in perfectly with me; my 3EB playlist on YouTube now has more than 40 songs. The sharp guitar riffs and fluid drum beats pleased my ears and led me to catch myself subtly swaying along more than a few times, but what pleased my mind were the lyrics. If you've ever listened to 3EB, you know exactly what I'm talking about here. Essentially an English teacher's wet dream, they're bursting at the seams with metaphor and imagery, and describe lovably relatable situations. Despite the overall bright sound, some of the lyrics are dark and even morose, but this is what resonates with the fanbase; it's music that doesn't tell any fairy tales. It presents reality to us, but in such a manner that creates sympathy and synergy, and the simple fact that it exists in this presentation style gives hope to the Misfits, as we like to call ourselves, that we aren't alone on this world. We use it to break our hearts and open our eyes.

To this day, I value music as the ultimate form of expressive art, and while I can't learn a chord or carry a tune to save my life, I use it to tell people how I really feel. Music is, in my experience, the best cure for a case of the blues, the quickest way to a woman's heart, and the optimum medium for celebration; it is a jet, a ship, and a train with a round trip ticket and no destination; it tore apart the Iron Curtain, proving itself as a unifier of mankind. All of this I firmly believe, and all of it started with one band.

Just this past March, ThefirstNapkin and I went to our first concert ever. Guess who it was?

I guess you can say our Third Eyes can finally see.

I still have pictures of us in our TEB shirts if anyone wants to see.

Quote: ThefirstNapkin

Quote: Metallo

*snip*

I still have pictures of us in our TEB shirts if anyone wants to see.

Do it.

Alright, back to the action.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

In the latter half of high school, I began to develop my prominent philosophy on life and how it should be lived....Or at least, how I thought I should live it. In summation, I promoted such intellectual actions as embracing emotion over logic, bestowing value upon the temporary as well as the permanent, and assigning significance to the plainest of occurrences. All of these, but especially the latter, contributed to the maturation of my religious ideals; while before I had just been a run-of-the-mill atheist, I now recognized that there exist forces in the universe too powerful and complex for human comprehension, questions too evasive and grandiose for science or reason to answer, and events too mysterious and appropriate to be considered base coincidence or fortunate serendipity. However, when I speak of these cryptic and elusive components of life, spectacular phenomena quickly come to mind when I'm actually describing the divinity within the mundane. This is another tale for another day, but in short, I'll just say that every day has its way of displaying this divinity. I do not have a name for it, this natural godliness, for I believe it already has one: magic.

Anyway, as junior year drew to a close and the end of secondary education crept ever closer, it became time for me to seriously think about a career. As previously mentioned, I wanted to join the military, but I never refined this idea until it actually mattered. After weighing the options, I decided that I wanted to become an officer in the Air Force. For the sake of clarity, to commission as an officer in the U.S. Armed Forces, one must have a four year bachelor's degree, unlike enlisting, where you simply enter after completing high school. You can do this in three ways: go to a military college, such as one of the U.S. Service Academies, in which you'll be automatically commissioned upon graduation; go to a civilian college and enter Officer Candidate School upon graduation, which is essentially the officers' boot camp; or go to a civilian college and participate in ROTC, in which you'll also commission upon graduation.

However, this was news to my parents, especially my dad. He had always assumed I was going to enlist, and therefore never gave a second thought to any collegiate education. The notion that I wanted to attend university frightened him; due to their unstable finances, my parents never saved a college fund for me, and while we aren't what most people would call poor, modern tuition would throw us into bankruptcy. Therefore, his natural reaction was to tell me that I'm not going to college and that I'll just have to think of something else.

Naturally, I was having none of this. I told him about financial aid and scholarships, which he largely ignored out of skepticism. I knew I could get it straightened out if he would only give me the chance, but he never listened. He became a broken record. We went to bat countless times over this; one night, I told him I had my mind set on it. His response was that I don't have my mind set on anything but playing video games, and that's when it hit me; he didn't think I was serious. He didn't think I was determined enough to accomplish anything. He didn't think I had given my future any consideration and that I was just saying random claptrap. When I told the more supportive adults in my life about this, they said that if I was going to be successful, I had to act upon it, with or without his support. So, I did.

Because of trips to JROTC leadership camps, I had originally considered the Citadel, a distinguished military college in South Carolina. However, because the Citadel is not a federal service academy, students must pay for their tuition. Because it was out of state, it would've amounted to the tune of $48,000 a year; a family like mine paying that is the closest thing to impossible short of breathing underwater, even with grants and scholarships. I briefly considered the Air Force Academy, but my dad put an end to that real quick, as Colorado is out of the question. Looking back, I wouldn't have wanted to go to a military college anyway; the environment is far too homogeneous for a wild card like myself.

The next step was to look within my own neck of the woods. I searched for universities in Georgia that had Air Force ROTC, and I immediately found my heartland: the University of Georgia. UGA is a Public Ivy and the state's flagship university, and everyone I knew there absolutely loved it. Come fall of senior year, I sent in my application, played the excruciating waiting game, and I'll never forget the way I screamed when I logged onto the website and saw the virtual fireworks heralding my admission. I'll also never forget the tone of my dad's voice as it echoed on the phone after I gave him the news. He was proud but worried, as this was before we tied up all of the financial loose ends. To the relief of everyone involved, however, those proved to be little threat; I had a full tuition scholarship from the state due to my high school GPA and SAT scores, the federal government gave me a pretty penny due to our correspondingly ugly income, and I had also won a couple of private scholarships from local and national organizations that amounted to several thousand dollars. In short, for my first year of uni, my family would have to pay zero dollars and zero cents.

At this point, you're likely thinking something to the tune of "Wow, you got lucky," and you'd be right. I was very lucky. But I can't tell you the sense of accomplishment this gave me. The fact that I was able to take a monumental risk and emerge financially unscathed was a big deal to me. For one of the few times in my life, I felt like the hero I had always dreamed of becoming. This motivated me beyond anything else I'd ever experienced, and I thought it couldn't get any better.

I'm happy to say that I was wrong.

Quote: Metallo

Alright, back to the action.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

In the latter half of high school, I began to develop my prominent philosophy on life and how it should be lived....Or at least, how I thought I should live it. In summation, I promoted such intellectual actions as embracing emotion over logic, bestowing value upon the temporary as well as the permanent, and assigning significance to the plainest of occurrences. All of these, but especially the latter, contributed to the maturation of my religious ideals; while before I had just been a run-of-the-mill atheist, I now recognized that there exist forces in the universe too powerful and complex for human comprehension, questions too evasive and grandiose for science or reason to answer, and events too mysterious and appropriate to be considered base coincidence or fortunate serendipity. However, when I speak of these cryptic and elusive components of life, spectacular phenomena quickly come to mind when I'm actually describing the divinity within the mundane. This is another tale for another day, but in short, I'll just say that every day has its way of displaying this divinity. I do not have a name for it, this natural godliness, for I believe it already has one: magic.

Anyway, as junior year drew to a close and the end of secondary education crept ever closer, it became time for me to seriously think about a career. As previously mentioned, I wanted to join the military, but I never refined this idea until it actually mattered. After weighing the options, I decided that I wanted to become an officer in the Air Force. For the sake of clarity, to commission as an officer in the U.S. Armed Forces, one must have a four year bachelor's degree, unlike enlisting, where you simply enter after completing high school. You can do this in three ways: go to a military college, such as one of the U.S. Service Academies, in which you'll be automatically commissioned upon graduation; go to a civilian college and enter Officer Candidate School upon graduation, which is essentially the officers' boot camp; or go to a civilian college and participate in ROTC, in which you'll also commission upon graduation.

However, this was news to my parents, especially my dad. He had always assumed I was going to enlist, and therefore never gave a second thought to any collegiate education. The notion that I wanted to attend university frightened him; due to their unstable finances, my parents never saved a college fund for me, and while we aren't what most people would call poor, modern tuition would throw us into bankruptcy. Therefore, his natural reaction was to tell me that I'm not going to college and that I'll just have to think of something else.

Naturally, I was having none of this. I told him about financial aid and scholarships, which he largely ignored out of skepticism. I knew I could get it straightened out if he would only give me the chance, but he never listened. He became a broken record. We went to bat countless times over this; one night, I told him I had my mind set on it. His response was that I don't have my mind set on anything but playing video games, and that's when it hit me; he didn't think I was serious. He didn't think I was determined enough to accomplish anything. He didn't think I had given my future any consideration and that I was just saying random claptrap. When I told the more supportive adults in my life about this, they said that if I was going to be successful, I had to act upon it, with or without his support. So, I did.

Because of trips to JROTC leadership camps, I had originally considered the Citadel, a distinguished military college in South Carolina. However, because the Citadel is not a federal service academy, students must pay for their tuition. Because it was out of state, it would've amounted to the tune of $48,000 a year; a family like mine paying that is the closest thing to impossible short of breathing underwater, even with grants and scholarships. I briefly considered the Air Force Academy, but my dad put an end to that real quick, as Colorado is out of the question. Looking back, I wouldn't have wanted to go to a military college anyway; the environment is far too homogeneous for a wild card like myself.

The next step was to look within my own neck of the woods. I searched for universities in Georgia that had Air Force ROTC, and I immediately found my heartland: the University of Georgia. UGA is a Public Ivy and the state's flagship university, and everyone I knew there absolutely loved it. Come fall of senior year, I sent in my application, played the excruciating waiting game, and I'll never forget the way I screamed when I logged onto the website and saw the virtual fireworks heralding my admission. I'll also never forget the tone of my dad's voice as it echoed on the phone after I gave him the news. He was proud but worried, as this was before we tied up all of the financial loose ends. To the relief of everyone involved, however, those proved to be little threat; I had a full tuition scholarship from the state due to my high school GPA and SAT scores, the federal government gave me a pretty penny due to our correspondingly ugly income, and I had also won a couple of private scholarships from local and national organizations that amounted to several thousand dollars. In short, for my first year of uni, my family would have to pay zero dollars and zero cents.

At this point, you're likely thinking something to the tune of "Wow, you got lucky," and you'd be right. I was very lucky. But I can't tell you the sense of accomplishment this gave me. The fact that I was able to take a monumental risk and emerge financially unscathed was a big deal to me. For one of the few times in my life, I felt like the hero I had always dreamed of becoming. This motivated me beyond anything else I'd ever experienced, and I thought it couldn't get any better.

I'm happy to say that I was wrong.

The best part of the story is coming up.

Quote: Wreckingball13

Quote: ThefirstNapkin

Quote: Metallo

*snip*

I still have pictures of us in our TEB shirts if anyone wants to see.

Do it.

https://gyazo.com/198123aded1fa43ebe8a0bf992660f87
https://gyazo.com/b53c84036c784cb9b059d2bec6ca5da8
https://gyazo.com/6c2ad0beec24b1cd13b8bba1aa8901e2

My senior year of high school turned out to be, at the time, the best school year of my life. Talk about saving the best for last, right? I've noticed that many situations in my life play out as if they were cut from the fabric of fiction, with the quintessential literary tropes that endure societal shifts and cultural relativism.

Before I describe the peaks, I'll write about the one unfortunate trough, just to go ahead and get it out of the way. Remember how I mentioned that I was the cadet commander of my JROTC unit? Well, at the end of each school year, we go on a big field trip somewhere out of the state: Kennedy Space Center my freshman year, the National Air Force Museum my sophomore year, and some Civil War battlefields in Chattanooga my junior year. For senior year, we were going back to Kennedy, also rather fitting - I swear my life could be a novel. When I heard the news that at the end, I would be returning to where it began, I took it as a message from fate that something extraordinary was about to happen, and so I was excited. And I was right, too. It wouldn't have been an issue had that event been something exciting.

Remember Becky from earlier? Bad news: she was a JROTC cadet as well. Worse news: she was going on the trip. There was another cadet in my room in the hotel, and there were some rumors that something had happened between Becky and this guy. I asked him if it did, and he said no. Knowing her reputation as a liar, I took his word over hers. Well, it wasn't until we got back to school that I found out it was true; at some point during the trip, she performed oral sex on him. At our school, the same rules apply on field trips as do at school, and so they were both suspended for a week. But they weren't the only ones who got in trouble; to make a long story short, I lost my rank and position because I didn't tell my instructor. However, while I was salty at first, I got over it. After all, I did screw up, and this was about three weeks before graduation, so I was about to lose it anyway.

Now, back to the good things. My acceptance to UGA was by far the best thing. Confidence comes easily when you stand before a new adventure, especially one born from your own efforts and achievements. As previously mentioned, my dad had begun taking his antidepressants, which healed his temperament and our relationship. My mom was promoted to director of the childcare/preschool facility at which she worked, a position she maintains today. Therefore, the fact that all three of us were not only happy with our current situations, but had much in the future to which we looked forward, spirits were high in the Johnson household. This was huge for me; for the first time since childhood innocence, I was truly happy with every aspect of my life and where it was heading.

Maria and I were still having some issues, but it cooled down as the year went on, and by the end of the year I had moved on to another girl. Let's call her Destiny. Destiny was one of the three other students accepted to UGA, and she was the Valedictorian of our class; success poured from that woman. Aside from putting the rest of us to academic shame, Destiny was the black (literally) sheep of my girlfriends. She was the only one who didn't give me an emotional hangover; she was the only one who was completely honest and straightforward with me; she was the only one who I honestly felt remorse for letting go. I royally screwed up with Destiny. My heart wasn't 100% in it from the get go, I had just latched on to the first person interested in me in a desperate attempt to get over Maria. I broke up with Destiny when I realized this, and I'll never forget the crash and burn in her voice. The good news is that she and I are still on good terms. The bad news is that I ruined the best shot I ever had at a normal relationship. But overall, I loved our experience. I learned from it and it bettered me as a person. I hope she can say the same.

However, even these emotions couldn't stand up to the triumph that lay ahead.

My AP English Literature and Composition teacher had a routine crucible for her seniors: an 18 to 22 page research paper detailing a classic author and analyzing three of his or her works. She had been assigning this paper for 31 years, and it counted for five test grades. If high school was a video game, this paper was the final boss; it had stopped many students from graduating before, as if those five failing grades took away their last five lives. On average, this was the grade distribution: maybe one or two As, a few Bs, a handful of Cs, and the rest of the class failed. It wasn't uncommon for students to make grades in the low 20s and teens, even the occasional zero for plagiarism.

Naturally, everyone was freaked out about this, including myself, despite liking to think that I'm a writer. However, I was also excited, as this was my chance to showcase my best work. I touted my identity as a Potterhead many times before, so you may be surprised when I say that my favorite author is not J.K. Rowling, and my favorite book is not from the HP series. No, not at all. My favorite author is F. Scott Fitzgerald, and my favorite book is The Great Gatsby. Not only does Fitzgerald's style provide grand inspiration for my own, but I resonated with Jay Gatsby himself. Never before had I seen a character with whom I identified so closely; his emotional grandeur and passionate expressions reminded me of myself and the sort of things I would do for love. Unfortunately, I don't have Gatsby's money....yet. But I digress. My choice for the paper, therefore, was no contest; I chose Fitzgerald, and the works I selected were Gatsby, The Beautiful and Damned, and Tender is the Night.

I wrote my heart out. I hit the full 22 pages, and my word count was somewhere in the ballpark of 7,200. Every word of every sentence was carefully drawn from the magic bag of tricks in my mind, with a great deal of help from Thesaurus.com of course, and I spent hours online and in libraries, selecting only the best analyses from the best experts. It didn't feel like I was writing a paper; it felt like I was painting a picture, or building a mansion, or crafting a ship in a bottle. Every move was delicately deliberate, every keystroke a permanent mark in time. My teacher let us come after school to look at old papers from previous students; with fixed eye I studied both the best and the worst of them, so I would have the clearest idea of what to do and what not to do. I did it all very methodically. I wrote one page per day, for fear that trying to write too much in one sitting would exhaust my mind and damage the quality, and before I started again, I re-read the previous day's page, revising as I went. I finished about a week and a half before the due date, so I took this time to revise my own as well as some of my friends' papers, and they returned the favor. Among those papers were Maria's and Destiny's - talk about mixing business with pleasure.

Enough of the journey, though. Let's get to the destination.

In 31 years of that paper, only one student ever made a 100.

Right now, he's on darkSpyro, writing the story of his life.

I only read the ending, but that last sentence was beautiful. ;~;

Quote: Eevee88

I only read the ending, but that last sentence was beautiful. ;~;

Oh, that's not the end! I still have my freshman year of college to cover. That's going to be at least two more posts.


I appreciate the comments, though. That goes for everyone. :)

Graduation day came and went. For most of my fellow seniors, it was sentimental and saccharine with a pungent aftertaste of finality. That's because, and I truly hate to say this, but for the average student from my school, high school really is the end; most of them don't go to uni, or even any college, and end up floating aimlessly around our hometown. However, this wasn't the case for me. Graduating didn't sadden me in the slightest, for my heart reveled and rejoiced in anticipation of the journey that lay ahead.

Before I knew it, I was no longer resting my back upon my plush bed in my little house in the woods, but instead upon the firm, untested mattress of a dorm room in the largest school in the state in the Classic City. I'd say my parents were a wreck, but that'd be an understatement bordering on dishonesty; they were mortified. Their only bird was finally leaving the nest, to begin the first attempts at what would eventually become his flight. They wondered if I'd be able to handle it. They wondered if I wouldn't shatter under the pressure. They wondered if I wouldn't call them every night, crying, moaning, begging to be rescued. I remember for quite some time, whenever I told my dad everything was okay, he'd respond with a skeptical "Are you sure?" It's not that they doubted me, they were merely plagued by the troubling second thoughts that assault every parent's security. And knowing the immense nature and colorful reputation of UGA, I'd be remiss to say that their doubt was without reason.

Well, except for the fact that I completely flourished. I excelled academically, found a calling in ROTC, made the best friends I've ever had, and came to peace with all of myself. Were it not for the fact that my parents and grandfather still lived in Dublin, I would call Athens home; that's how it felt, at least. Remember how I said senior year of high school was the most eventful? Yeah, I had no clue what was going to hit me. It was almost as if I relived my entire life in one year; every single day was a new adventure, seasoned with laughter and tears and just the right amount of sugar. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me go step by step.

First and foremost, there's ROTC. What can I say? It was the real deal. See, high school JROTC is only a development program, but college ROTC is actually training you for a military career. While I won't go into detail for security reasons, I'll say that it's leaps and bounds more involved than its high school counterpart, and I learned more than I can begin to describe. During spring semester, I actually received an ROTC scholarship and became a contracted cadet. I didn't burn myself out because I was still focusing hard on academics, but I can't wait to hit it hard again this coming semester. It's done wonders for my confidence.

There's also not really much to say about academics. I'm a journalism major, but haven't taken any major specific classes yet. Basically, I tried my hardest, and I finished first semester with a 4.00 GPA and the year overall with a 3.96. It gave me a sense of fulfillment I can't even begin to describe, to know that I was beating the system, to know that I was beating statistics. And I don't plan on slowing down anytime soon.

Oh, okay, I'm boring you. Alright then, let's get to the fun part: my personal life.

As soon as I moved in, I met another girl. I'm not even going to give her a name, as the only important thing about this relationship is how it led me to self-examination. See, being alone for the first time in your life, it makes you think. You think about the past and what remains of it: you. Who you are today. Who you want to be. Forget it, I'll just cut to the chase. I started to remember every time a relationship failed, every time I was bullied, and every issue I had at home, and I started to drill into every aspect of those situations, wondering what could've been different. Naturally, this made me feel sad, and it definitely affected my behavior. When I told my new girlfriend about this, and how it was dragging me down, she curtly told me that it wasn't normal and I needed to change. She told me that I needed to see a professional, implying many times before outright stating that she thought I was mentally ill. She was a rock, a locked steel door, an empty tomb.

While she wasn't exactly part of the problem, she definitely wasn't helping, either. I hoped against hope that nothing was wrong with me, but I knew something had to change when one night, I curled into a ball in the corner of my dorm kitchen and cried. For no apparent reason.

With practically no one else to whom to turn, for the first time in ages, I gave Maria a call. While she didn't think anything was wrong with me, she admitted that it probably wouldn't be a bad idea to sit down with a professional and just talk some of this stuff out. So, the next time my girlfriend mentioned it, I gave the campus counseling office a call and made my first appointment. The reason why Maria convinced me instead of her is because Maria was also emotionally supportive, and to me, that made all the difference. Unfortunately, before I could go to that first appointment, my girlfriend handed me a letter; in it, she stated that I reminded her of her mentally ill uncle, which apparently triggered her depression and anxiety, and therefore, our relationship was done. I can't remember if she was ever diagnosed, but if she's telling the truth, I suppose I can't hold it against her. She just made me feel less than human. And that really hurt.

Anyway, I went to the counseling sessions, and they helped. A lot. I won't go into detail, but I was completely uplifted. I don't know if it was that or the end of my toxic relationship, but all of a sudden, thoughts of the past no longer troubled me. I had my confidence back. Everything was starting to look up. And I mean everything.

i gotta get more popcorn.

this is getting good!

While the counseling sessions and my newfound freedom facilitated the boost in my mood, what actively triggered the climax was one nerdy activity I'd never pictured myself doing: Dungeons & Dragons. However, it was through those first few sessions and subsequent events that I met the best group of friends I think I've ever had, my "squad," as the kids say these days. Allow me to introduce them. Let's call them by these names:

-Amon: You all know him as ThefirstNapkin. Easily my best buddy, and, as he says, the one who got me into JoJo. Uncanny skill at Smash. Sells meme and meme accessories. He's half-Indian, half-Pakistani, and all amazing.
-Cedric: The most adorably sardonic white guy you'll ever meet. Well-spoken, well-read, and well-thought. He bears a disturbing physical resemblance, and a non-existent personal one, to John Green. Oh, and he's also ace. Perfect combination of serious and silly.
-Sunshine: A League-addicted Filipina. We like to call her Kaweeaboo. Probably the most adaptive and supportive in the whole group; regardless of the plan, she's always game. Best person to talk to at 2 AM about life, liberty, and the pursuit of insanity. When it goes down, she's always loyal, loving, and listening, no matter how much hell we give her. And she's reading this right now. Love you Kaweeaboo!
-Miranda: Resident SJW, except she actually does stuff IRL instead of tumblr and social media slacktivism. She dresses, in her own words, "like Death's teenage daughter." Keeps Domino's in business. Easy to talk to. Easy to love. Oh, and no matter how she tries to hide it, she loves puns.
-Gavin: Blond Viking. A walking encyclopedia of YouTube Poop, guns, and video games. Sings with the uni's men's chorus. Loves to reminisce on old cartoons and faded fads. History buff. Never really feels like squad without him.
-Ronald: Nigerian prodigy. The one who talked me into D&D and our GM. Also a Magic enthusiast. Unique taste in music that perfectly fits his personality.
-Roma: Local princess; bubbly, bouncy, and bratty, in the cutest way. Randomly jabbers at us in Hindi and makes Bollywood references nobody gets. To ThefirstNapkin and me, she's sometimes our mom and other times our baby sister. Drives us up the wall, but we couldn't live without her.

And there are many others, but we'd be here all night. These are just the main ones.

Speaking of all night, I've spent countless ones with these people. Whether it's guzzling Japense soda, or watching B-horror movies, scared only by their atrocious quality, or crowding the local chicken joint and standing out in the crowd of the normies, or simply seasoning the night with soul-searching, I've never felt more at home than with these beautifully beastly people. I ask myself how I got that lucky, to find such great friends. Like I said earlier, despite my lack of religion, I do believe that there are grand designs upon this world, and everything happens for a reason. Every one of these kindred souls is a testament to the power of love, honor, and friendship, and the fact that humans are capable of such power is a declaration of our own divinity. Ultimately, I think that's probably what people God. The love we have for each other is what cuts through the temporal darkness and illuminates the eternal truth of mankind. And that my best friends have been able to demonstrate that gives me hope. Through family issues, academic failures, grand existentialism, and personal shortcomings, we've stuck together and supported each other. And we're going to do it a hell of a lot more over the next few years.

Only two more major events happened in my freshman year of college, and I'll start with the sadder of the two. I lost a friend in the worst way possible; he not only left me, he left the world. He was a fellow cadet, one of my best friends in ROTC. We don't know how it happened, as neither his family nor the Powers That Be will tell us. 18 years and millions of memories cast into oblivion. He was such a happy guy; I don't remember seeing him ever genuinely upset about anything. We attended the funeral in uniform. He was a member of the family. He is a member of the family. I owe it to him to be the best I can possibly be. For him. For us.

The second was that I met another girl, and this was definitely the craziest relationship I've ever been in. Let's call her Sadie. Sadie aggressively pursued me; the first time I saw her, I got her number. The second time, we kissed. The third time, third base. Before I knew it, the last of my innocence was gone. I was saving my virginity, not for marriage, but for someone who wouldn't make me regret it later, and I thought I had found her. Long story short, I was wrong. Sadie was not at all like me; she was uncomfortable about the idea of us being official, but she still wanted me. Three days after the deed was done, we broke up; the next week, she invited me over to spend the night. When I demanded answers, she told me that she wanted to be friends with benefits. Now, I knew this was a bad idea; if we're being completely honest with ourselves, Sadie threw up red flags from the very start. I knew she was going to play me. So what did I do?

I went through with it anyway.

We had sex a few more times over the next few weeks, much to the disappointment of my friends. Sadie was a Machiavellian elitist; I didn't know it was possible for someone to be promiscuous and condescending at once, but she proved me wrong. However, I still slept with her. I figured that I had always bashed casual relationships, but I had never actually tried one, so maybe it was what I needed. Now, I know that my gut was right. Casual isn't for me. Our "relationship" finally culminated in a shouting match; since she's not returning to UGA this upcoming semester, it's likely I'll never see her again. Among her final words to me were, "It's a game. It's always a game." You're right, Sadie. With you, it is a game. It's a game that I'm never going to play again. It's a game that I hope you keep playing until you finally lose.

Soon after that, spring semester ended and I went home for the summer. And that's where I am now, in my chair, in front of my computer, in my little house in the woods, back where we started.


Well folks, there you have it. That's my life up until now. Why'd I write this? To be perfectly honest with you, I don't know. Maybe I wanted to make peace with my past. Maybe the loss of my wingman drew my attention to my own delicate slice of time. Maybe it was just a spur of the moment ordeal to exercise my writing skills. I don't know why, but I do know how. I know now exactly how one can make one's own life matter, or more appropriately, recognize the fact that one's own life matters. I know now how to validate one's own existence. I know now how the answer to the question of how, how can I do something about it? How can I do something about anything?

I know now exactly how:

We all have a story. We just need to tell it.

*Stands up and claps* A wonderful story, thank you for sharing it! :D

Wow I can't believe Metallo's dead.

Jk, this was actually a really interesting read!

Well done and well wrapped up like always, being friends with you is the best thing to ever happen to me my freshman year of college, love you, dude.

*claps*

I appreciate it, everyone!

That was super intruiging, thanks for sharing! :-)