Home?

Week one of zoo camp is over and done with. It was really nice to be back at work and spend all week hanging out up at the zoo. I just fell right back into the swing of things and I felt at home again.

I have realized that for me, the feeling of home is more of a moment rather than one particular place. Certain things will create that nice "home" feeling for me. Sometimes it will be a person. Other times it is a certain moment at a place I love. Either way, I have found that home is relative for me. And I am becoming more unattached from my family. I guess that is what happens while you "grow up".

The trouble is, I am not sure how fast I really want to grow up. I didn't think it would come this quickly. I kept telling myself I would have more time to be a kid. And it seems like it just keeps coming and there is nothing I can do about it.

I am lonely. I am tired of feeling alone. No matter what I do, I can't fill that void. That hole is starting to eat away at me. I just need to get back to normal. Whatever that is.

It sucks when you can feel completely alone and be surrounded by people. A small fish in a big pond. I go unnoticed. I miss my friends. I just want them back. And I am tired of waiting.

Refreshed--and some other thoughts

I went away for a week and feel refreshed. It sucks to feel like a prisoner in your own home. The last month in Portland has been unbearable for a few reasons:

1) My family is sort of boring and they aren't into doing anything but being at home. I am not that kind of person.
2) I have spent a good amount of my own money helping them out with unexpected bills. Having Mom unemployed for almost 6 months was really tough on us financially and emotionally.
3) I desperately miss my friends from Nampa, a few in particular. And I didn't realize how much I needed them until I left.
4) Those same friends are currently spread across the world and unreachable by phone. I sustain merely on emails and blog entries.
5) My best friend from here is gone for the summer.
6) I have been wrestling with feelings for a boy and afraid to say anything to him about it.

But the biggest thing on my mind has been my Dad. I find myself going over memories, both good and bad, that I have of him throughout my childhood. I think it appropriate today to just share the best memory I have of him when I was a child:

It was a long-standing tradition with my Dad to get me flowers for my birthday. Every year, without fail. He would always get me roses, and the amount would always correspond with my new age (for those who don't understand, I got a dozen roses when I turned 12). When I was in elementary school, my dad would make a special trip to see me at school and deliver my roses to me in person.

And for one day a year, I felt like the LUCKIEST GIRL in the world.
For once, I could feel the love my Daddy had for me.

He eventually stopped doing that. He wouldn't bring them to school anymore, but he would have them waiting for me when I got home from school. He continued this until I turned 16, and then it was just not worth it.

My parents separated when I turned 16. And from that point on, he quit trying to be in my life. And I really wasn't sad about it. Life got better from then on.

The problem is that I KNOW my Dad loves me. But he is incapable of showing it in healthy and constructive ways. And I am sick of being the one who is hurt in the process. At some point, it becomes a matter of self-preservation.

I just miss those few-and-far between moments where he made me feel special and loved. He hasn't been like that for a long time.

And I guess at the heart of it, I wish I had a Daddy with his head on straight.

Sleepless thoughts

I said goodbye to a dear friend tonight. A friend that I won't be seeing for quite sometime. I guess you could say that he is my "rock" when I am living in Portland. I feel comfortable talking to him about anything. He keeps me sane when I am tired of being here.

I will soon be out of consistent communication with some other friends that I care a lot about. Some other people who keep me sane when it seems like things are falling apart. I feel as though I have nobody. And the fault rests with me.

Because in the last nine months, I have allowed myself to need other people. I kept myself from feeling that way for a long time. I knew how dangerous it could be to depend on other people, especially when they let you down. As a result, I became an island.

But we all know that no man (or woman) is an island. Eventually you have to venture out and get the things you need.

What I needed were people who loved me. And up until now, I haven't admitted that because I have never allowed myself to need people. The closest I came to needing people was my family, but I have learned that I can live without them. I have slowly began pushing them out of my life, unintentionally. I never meant to, but I learned to get by without them.

Because, in the end, we will all end up alone. And we have to deal with that scary truth. So I began preparing myself for that truth a long time ago.

So I find myself here tonight, feeling utterly alone. It is no one's fault but my own, and I am sure people tire of me talking about how bored I am, blah blah blah.

But I don't want to feel like this all summer. And it is looking to be a pretty lonely summer already, and I still have 2 and a half months left.

So I am going to try and sleep now. Lately it has been hit or miss.

In like...

So, there is this boy... and I hate to be too girly right now, but until I came back home I didn't realize how much I miss him. I didn't anticipate feeling this way. But here is the truth:

I have been fighting my feelings for him for the past year. For the situation I was in, I felt like it wasn't the right time. And throughout the past school year, we have been on and off with our timing.

Now that I haven't seen him for like three weeks, I realize that I really do care about him. A lot more than I thought I did. And there comes a time when I have to stop lying to myself and face the way I feel.

If I don't say anything to him and let him know how I feel, I will always wonder if he felt the same way. And I don't want to leave anything in my life to regret.

I need to finally take the plunge and tell him how I feel. Risk being shut down. Risk being hurt by someone else in my life. However, I don't know if I can handle being rejected by him. I care too much about him. He is one of my best friends.

The shit will hit the fan in about two weeks. I will see him again.

I imagine that when I see him in the Washington D.C. airport, my heart will tell me exactly how I feel. I will know, at that moment, if this is real. If it is, and the time is right, I am going to tell him. Because I can't keep making excuses for myself.

Eventually we have to grow up and own up to what we want. I just hope that I can do the same.

Thoughts thus far

I have been home from school for about two weeks now. I haven't done much at all yet because work hasn't started. I have really just sat around and slept. Which isn't all that great.

Three days of nothing is fine. But two weeks is getting exhausting. Suffocating. I can't handle being idle so long. I have been so restless. I really need to get a life.

I also miss my friends. A lot. My family has become so different. They don't have any ambition or drive in their lives. At school, I am surrounded by people that are constantly working towards something and so they understand the struggles I go through. They see me everyday, at my best and my worst. I love my family, but I don't think I belong here. I can't see myself living here for an extended period of time after school gets out.

I saw one of my friends yesterday and had to say goodbye to her. I won't get to talk to her or my best friend until August. My best friend from home, Tyler, is only home for a week and a half. Then he will be gone for the rest of the summer. I don't know how I am going to make it. I am already falling apart. I laid in bed and cried last night because yesterday was the best I have felt since I came home. And I won't get that for a long time.

Because I am stuck here in this hellhole, I trying to find something productive. So I want to write. But I want something worthwhile. Something epic. I want something honest and amazing that other people will read and think "Wow, she is brilliant." But I don't know if I can do that. I am not sure if I can pull it together. Or be honest enough with myself.

I believe to write, you must be honest and frank. People see through bullshit pretty quick.

Overall, I am just hurting. Aching for people. And I have never really allowed myself to NEED anyone. Life is much easier that way. When you need people, you have the potential to be hurt. And I am just so sick of being hurt.

Looking back five months

I struggled with depression at about the age of 14. I am not sure exactly what triggered it, but I think I can attribute it to a couple of different things.
For one, my dad was getting worse and worse with his drinking. I was beginning to resent him for not protecting me from certain things and neglecting myself and the rest of my family. It was becoming too much to handle at once. I was getting tired of the same old crap from him.
My brother had found himself a serious girlfriend he began spending every second with. I think it was his way of getting away from my dad and the way he treated us. Alex and I had always been a package deal. As much as we fought, I felt safe around him. He would stick up and fight for me. The two of us had to grow up pretty early, and we did it together. Now he had left me behind, many times to deal with my belligerant Dad.
My mom was working a lot as well, and she was finding other ways to be absent. The stress of their marriage and my dad's drinking was taking a toll on her especially. She didn't really know what to do with him anymore and he was drinking away a lot of our money.

Then there was me. I was left alone. I tried to be gone as much as possible. I would dread coming home from school everyday, but I also hated going to school everyday. I didn't have a lot of friends and was still being made fun of (yes, in 8th grade) on a regular basis.

Every morning I woke up I wanted to die. I didn't know what the point was in living. I felt like no one gave a shit. I felt like nothing. I would think about what life would be like without me, and I decided things would have probably be better. They couldn't get any worse.
I thought about death a lot. Mostly about killing myself and saving my family and friends the trouble of dealing with me. I had convinced myself that their lives would be better if I was gone.

So I started writing a letter. THE letter, to be exact. The one that I would leave behind when my soul would leave earth. I wanted peace so badly. I wanted to be happy again, and I couldn't see that being a reality for me. Ever again. I just wanted to be done with everything and everyone I knew.

I planned it out. I knew a time when no one would be home. I had the letter done. I had a knife. I was so set on it.

Something stopped me. To this day, I can't tell you what it was. All I know is that all of a sudden, while sitting in the middle of my living room looking at my wrist and holding a kitchen knife, something filled me. A calm came over me and I felt warm. And this whole situation felt wrong. I dropped the knife and pulled out my Bible (random, I thought) and started reading. I laid in my bed curled up reading, crying my eyes out.

I had almost taken my own life because I thought I had nothing to live for, as an 8th grader! I couldn't see past my own pain. I couldn't see that there was an answer. That no matter how shitty things got, there would be someone there for me.

Eventually my depression got to the point where people noticed. And my mom found out eventually that I had thought about suicide, although I don't think she realized how close I was. I began going to youth group with some friends who knew I desired a church but didn't have one. Thus began my spiritual renewing and a clear purpose for my life.

I found hope in one of my favorite verses I stumbled across that night I almost killed myself: "He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever" (Rev. 21:4).

Last semester, I was falling into this pattern again. I woke up everyday and didn't understand why I was here. I wanted to leave school because I absolutely hated it. I was working myself to death and therefore time with God was stretched. I didn't feel I had anyone to turn to. All the people who were trying to help me I successfully pushed away, even though I wasn't doing it consciously. I was so afraid to let people in, and I still am. Always will be.

I have a hard time asking for help. And I didn't want anyone to know how I was feeling, because I remembered exactly how it escalated last time. I didn't want it to get that far. So I denied that it was happening for a really long time. I thought that not acknowledging it was the best way to go. Unfortunately people saw right through that. And I was a pretty unpleasant person to be around.

How great am I blessed? God has put a lot of positive people in my life. I just wish I could find it in myself to open up to them and trust them. If only I could trust God as well--things would work out a lot better.

Trust violated is tough to get back. Someday I might dismantle that wall I build between myself and everyone else I know.

The future as of the present

So I am sitting here trying to come up with an idea for this stupid essay for Dennis. And I find myself with few things to care about at the present moment. I have had a lot of things on my mind lately and classes are far from it.

I have found myself wondering what I will do after college. I am going to be graduating with a teaching degree, but I am worried that it is not what I really want to do with my life. What if I get in the classroom and hate it? Is this really what I want to commit my life to?

What if I decided to work with animals instead? Or better yet, I could combine the two and work in conservation education. That is probably why I love my summer job. There is so much to know in the field of conservation and it is noble work. Someone needs to do it, it might as well be me.

But I chickened out. It’s not that I don’t love the major I am in right now. I am just not sure if I love it AS MUCH as something else. Something I have felt a calling towards for a long time.

Unfortunately, a lot of people around me don’t understand the importance this has in my life. They don’t get what I am passionate about. Therefore, they don’t get me. I have a friend who has been somewhat scolding me and trying to be my mother about this situation. She is encouraging me to follow what I really want and possibly rethink my whole college career. I will have wasted four years on a degree I don't want. And I understand where she is coming from. But I really don’t know what to do about this.

Too much going on right now. This started out as a stupid free write for class. And now I ended up worse off than before.