I'm sick and tired of being such a self-concerned idiot.
I assume that everything is my problem alone, forgetting that there are people out there-- in my own family, damn it-- with horrible problems that I just ignore and overlook because I'm selfishly thinking that I'm such a special bastard that I'm the only one who has to suffer.
Well, wake up and smell the blood and gunpowder, dear. You're no scapegoat in this world.
I can do nothing to change that.
Laurie is freaking furious with me, too. I don't blame her... if I were in her position, I'd have done the exact same thing.
Why am I so weak?
God help me, I am so tired of this.
What do I need to do to finally be free? What do I need to sacrifice?
My money, my possessions, my pride? Take them, if it gets me out of this personal hell.
Problem is, none of that is going to solve that. I know.
I think I need to sacrifice something much bigger... or maybe, the answer is cruelly simple. Maybe.
Maybe I just need to keep trying. Maybe I just need to fight a little harder.
Maybe I just need to leave this place.
I guess I should be thankful that I'm not living in a warzone, living each day afraid of the next, knowing that any moment a bomb could hit or I could be captured or I could lose everything I'd ever known.
I've never known the feel of a real physical bullet. I've never tasted my own blood flooding my mouth in terror. I've never watched someone die in front of me.
My heart goes out to the poor souls who
do live that sort of hellish reality, and when it comes back it's torn with broken bones and shrapnel and shards of glass and it tears me apart on the inside for being such a blind and selfish bastard.
I've wanted to be a martyr since I was a kid, but the more I see what's happening in the world and the more blood I see on the television and the deeper my empathy ironically gets at all the wrong times, the more frightened I get.
I feel like a little kid, shivering and crying because an unknown terror cloaked in shadows is holding an icy pistol to my forehead and I know it's only because I asked for it... because it's the only decent and dignified way to die.
I want to die for someone, for something good, for some purpose.
I know so many people pray for an easy, quick death... to die in their sleep, to quietly pass away on a sunny evening or something.
No sane person prays to die in a car crash, or in a hanging, or in front of a firing squad, or from ebola.
And yet I pray to be a martyr, even now.
Maybe I feel I have to prove something.
Will giving my life for something pure finally help to redeem me? Will it?
Am I that broken, that I feel the only way to be saved now is to completely surrender to what I feel is right?
They say there's never a guarantee that you're going to heaven... but I guess there's never a guarantee that you're going to hell, either.
It's scary because I always assume the worst. It takes a heavy toll on my personality, though.
Oh well. Gotta suck it up and take it like a man.
Swallow those needles, kid, it's either you or the next guy and you're at least willing to suffer for someone else's sake. I'm terrified.
I dream of these things. I feel these things, and my body shivers and my eyes tear up and I hope that it won't be so horrifying when my time comes, but of course there are never any guarantees.
Since I was a little kid, I've always seen suffering, always seen symbols of pain. I don't know why.
I used to draw bloody pictures when I was in
kindergarten, for the love of heaven. I've found several of them upstairs, dated by my mother and signed with that hideous scribble I called a name at age 5. God only knows why she kept them, but I'm glad she did.
I've found dream journals of mine from 1st grade, dreams in which I would turn into bats and eventually find myself skewered with needles and bleeding in the snow somewhere. I was fascinated with those dreams, and used to write about them all the time... my teacher literally thought I was crazy.
Second grade I took my little vow of celibacy. I was absolutely disgusted with the fact that my classmates were always swooning over N*Sync and Hanson and every other pretty boy out there, especially at their age (yes I used to think like that)... so disgusted, in fact, that one day I quite literally swore to myself that I would never marry, and that I would never fall for some older man like those other silly girls. Surprisingly, that's one of the few promises I've managed to keep.
Third grade was the Pokemon phenomenon, as well as the year I met Preludove. I was still seeing far too much violence in my mind. Sure, I would draw happy dreamlike scenes with the characters I loved, but five minutes later I'd be drawing that same character getting gorily eaten by some hideous nightmare monstrosity. I bet the teachers worried about me.
Fourth grade I got much closer to the Jewel Monsters, and that also kicked my obsession with spirituality and matters of the heart into high gear. I practically became a crazy kid philosopher back then, often locking myself in my room and sitting on my bed by the old bureau... thinking about the Dream World and wondering what life was like for everybody else. I began to draw several small comics, full of adventure and childhood happiness and an obvious amount of fighting. I spent most of my time lost in my imagination, spending entire afternoons having my Mewtwo plushie chase after the beams of sunlight on the living room rug.
Unfortunately, along with the imagination and wisdom came a deeper understanding of suffering. The Dream World was still reeling from war, you know, and I was quickly becoming caught up in it. Preludove almost died in the first dream I had of her, you know.
Fifth grade and my friends started leaving... the kids that made me smile began to disappear. I became ostracized when I couldn't fit in to the new cliques... I was frequently taken advantage of by the girls who used to be my closest companions. It hurt me terribly. I was still drawing and writing, but I admittedly don't remember most of fifth grade.
Sixth grade was the best year of my life. I had buried myself in the matters of the Dream World, and my Links had hit a beautifully high point. I spent some time every day either drawing them, writing about them, or composing music for them on my piano... they defined my life back then.
Don't forget about my darker side, though. 2001 was the last year before the breaking point in their world, and I was beginning to see the serious signs of it, although I didn't fully understand them at the time. I still spent a great deal of time writing about pain, though. Morbid fascination.
Everything started to fall to pieces in seventh grade. Something horribly dark and bloody happened in the Dream World, and I clearly remember standing alone in the hall of my school when the news hit me. Thank God I was alone, because I stopped right there and just thought it over for a minute. Of course, I still couldn't fully comprehend it, but it was enough to make me start seeing pain all over again.
I fell in love with both Bakura and Marik during that year (I still can't decide if that was good or bad), and also hit a horrible immaturity snag which caused me some terrible problems later on. I only had one person who I could call a friend then, and she even started abusing me... I was stupid and I betrayed her trust in return. I still don't know how I could have been so stupid.
Eighth grade was a mess. I fell in love with Chaos Zero then, triggering an entirely new philosophical vein in my mind. I was still writing about the Dream World, but my teenage stupidity was breaking my Links and I began to forget what was important. I began writing a completely un-canon document full of nothing but blood and pain, perhaps to unconsciously remind me that life wasn't all senseless fun.
Ninth grade... I don't even remember, and I suppose that's for the best. It was the typical high-school immaturity phase for me, and I began to turn into a total weeaboo. Dear heavens but I really despised that time in my life... the only real saving graces of that year were NiGHTS and Normandy, who both hit me out of the blue and managed to keep me somewhat connected to my heart.
Ironically, although I was losing my very self, my mother bought me the first issue of X1999 that year, so my unhealthy obsession with suffering only got worse.
Tenth grade was a little better, but not by much. I was still horribly immature, but Justice's brother showed up that same year so I quickly realized that I was doing things all wrong. Revenge was a major contribution to the suffering side of my personality... as was Selph, who I met the same year. Meeting Selph, though, and having to teach him everything he knew... it forced me to take a better look at who I was and how I was living, and I finally began to change. I'm very thankful for that.
Eleventh grade was mixed as well. I began to get rather anorexic, and made the huge mistake of practically ignoring Selph for about a year thanks to my idiotic selfishness. I began to hide from reality through my computer, which once again caused me a ton of pain in the long run. However, being the year I turned 16, I was trying exceptionally hard to re-connect with the Jewel Monsters. It worked surprisingly well; I met many more of them and began to regain quite a bit of my old inspiration.
The war in this world was also getting pretty bad, and my selfishness began to plummet as a result. That was actually a good thing, as my now dismal self-esteem was forcing me to super-evaluate myself now, and I began to experience some real suffering myself for once.
I got back together with Selph later that year, too.
Twelfth grade... geez. Bad year, very bad year. Family life began to go downhill for outside reasons, I fell into a severe depression, regressed into my teenage stupidity mode as a blind form of 'looking for relief.' Didn't work. I regret most of the things that happened during this year.
However, thanks to Philosophy and Psychology classes, I kept some of my maturity... and thanks to JTHM, the bloody edges of my mind got a heck of a lot bloodier. It was summer when everything finally hit me and I realized just how idiotic I had been acting for months... the stress of everything so far sent me into a downward spiral.
Freshman year at college, aka the present day. I won't review much of it here as it's tiring and you already know what happened... it's this journal, for the love of Pete.
However... not long after the fall semester started, I lost my mind. Literally.
I still refuse to talk about that incident to anyone, and I've forgotten half of it thanks to my mind's way of reacting to trauma... but what I do remember is frightening. Either way, that bizarre event shocked my system so badly that my hinges broke and I've been a shivering mess ever since.
I'm still smothering in my own misdeeds, but I'm trying desperately to get my Links back up as I'm afraid there one of the few things left with the power to keep me alive anymore. God gave me my connections for a damn good reason, and I know it.
My mind has begun to regress into a childlike state, too. I'm literally getting entire days where I can see things through my old eyes again, and during those times Laurie swears herself in as my big sister and promises that she'll protect me with her life.
I like that, because if Julie comes after me when I'm a kid upstairs, I get terribly scared and call for my violet superego, and she shows up every time. She's saved me many times that way, but something happened today where I called her but Julie actually chased her out or something... it's frightening me. I don't want her touching me, I don't even want her looking at me... can't I just lock her away like I used to when I was younger? Can't we just lock her up in that closet down the hallway and warn everyone not to go in there? But no... she won't sit still now. She can't be tied up now, and sometimes I just cry thinking about it.
I don't know what I've gotten myself into.
But yes. Suffering.
It went from a strange childhood obsession to an unintentional empathy to a personal understanding.
I don't mind, but... is there a reason that it's always been so present in my life, in one way or another? Is there a reason that I seem to seek it out, that I seem to gravitate to it and feel it when someone else is its victim?
I only know one thing, and that is this...
...I have so, so much more suffering ahead of me.
I'm terrified.
So selfish... I'm forgetting about everyone else.
I hope that one day I can see again.
Realign all the stars above my head
Warning signs travel far
I drink instead on my own
Oh, how I've known
The battle scars and worn out beds
Gentle now a tender breeze blows
Whispers through a Gran Torino
Whistling another tired song
Engines hum and bitter dreams grow
Heart locked in a Gran Torino
It beats a lonely rhythm all night long
These streets are old
They shine with the things I've known
And breaks through the trees
They're sparkling
Your world is nothing more than all the tiny things you've left behind
So tenderly
Your story is nothing more than what you see
Or what you've done or will become
Standing strong, do you belong in your skin,
Just wondering?
Gentle now a tender breeze blows
Whispers through the Gran Torino
Whistling another tired song
Engines hum and bitter dreams grow
A heart locked in a Gran Torino
It beats a lonely rhythm all night long
May I be so bold
And still need someone to hold
That shudders my skin
It's sparkling
Your world is nothing more than all the tiny things you've left behind...
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