Occupational Hazard.

It is really very annoying when you hit that age - that really annoying age where people can't tell how old you are. At least...that's what has always happened with me. People can never tell how old I am - either i'm 12 or i'm 21. It's very strange, not to mention, extremely bloody annoying.

I'm wary of walking down the street with my parents. I now refuse to walk down the street (or anywhere for that matter) with my father, alone, if my mother is not there. Because - YES, this actually happens - people think I'm his wife. And that has such icky connotations, I can't even begin to unpack it, besides not wanting to unpack it. My mother and I look alot alike - and so people think "hmm, they are sisters". And this is really fucking annoying. Because, yes, my mother looks young....but she does not look THAT young. so either I look old and tired or she looks sparkling and young...which, no offense mom, you don't.

This is the occupational hazard of having parents that are far too young to be your parents. It's very annoying; either you're the wife or the dumpy sister and I want to scream at people's extreme stupidities for generalizing and thinking one way or the other. Having young parents is solely embarassing and, even though they can get you underage drinks, and you could potentially party with them doesn't mean you WANT to.

It was absolutely mortifying, for example, when my father would come to pick me up in his rare occasions of fatherly duty from my high school. And there would be a group of afghan girls that would stare and giggle as he passed. It was really quite nauseating, the way they would look back and pointedly stare him down, as if baiting him. It made me gag, not only at the process of the main human mating ritual (because this stare was not only reserved for him - it was pretty much there for any male in the school, the attitude being, look, drool and don't touch; affirmation basically, ugh, sickening) but because my father was the object of it.

My parents got married young - 21 (well...it's young in my books) and had a kid the very next year. So basically they were kids having a kid (and I turned out really messed up and neurotic for it). While all the other parents are now 50 or approaching such, my parents are approaching 41 or 45.

The curse (or blessing) of the genes in our family makes it so that all the women (on my mother's side) are slight and...lineless for the most part. My grandmother is 65 but looks like she is 50. It's really quite disconcerting. My mother, similarly, is 43...but pretty much looks like she is 32. But, no, I will NOT concede to the fact that she looks my age (and I, by default thus look her age) because that is a first-glance exaggeration.

The non-aging thing got passed on to me. Generally, women who are shorter and slighter look younger anyway, but at least my mother looks mature. I am on the short side, with a slight build and - I have glasses. Shit. I...look like a woman-child, which is very annoying. When I dress up, however, I look like I'm ready to bust a move because I'm naturally curvaceous yet my face is young. It is very, very annoying. I am a woman child and that makes me sad. It also gives me no hope for the future because I will forever look young (kiddy young), and not tall and amazing like that KT Tunstall song.

And its not just getting carded - who cares about that crap. It's the fact that, when I was in grade 7 and I wore dorky butterfly clips, this really big boobed fast assed blonde is like omg are you in grade 3? even though our classes were RIGHT next to each other and i was a chatterbox so she knew who i was. Dumb cow.

I really just wish people would stop generalizing, however, and use their brains. My friend, Katharine has a fifteen year difference with her little brother - me, i'm not so bad, its only a 10 year difference with my younger brother. Yet, whenever she was out for a walk with him, or pushing his stroller, people would shoot her dirty looks. They all automatically assumed: teenage pregnancy.

You know what? Fuck you. Pardon my french. But wow, can you not take TWO seconds to UN-generalize and UN-assume about people? Is that so hard? To look at people and NOT cast a judgement on what infitesimal detail you THINK you've discerned? Upon close inspection, me and mother not only look differentiable, but it is clear who is the mother and who is the daughter. But people always fucking generalize: "Oh my god, you two are sisters!" And it's not just flattery; people with no motives, nothing behind their words other than what they think is keen observation, will say this. And it gets me angry. Not because this means either that she's impossibly young or that I'm glaringly old. But because, people are constantly generalizing. About everything: culture, hair, race, clothes, what have you.

And quite frankly, it's disheartening.

So next time you see a really old guy with a really young chick. Don't pass judgement. Don't try to figure out their relationship - it doesn't concern you! Marvel at them individually, if there is anything to marvel at and make rational statements. And to all afghan girls at Marc Garneau, my father is not on the market. So piss off.

Cheers.

The Promised Land

So I was talking to a friend last night at this pre-new years reunion party thing. She goes to Berkeley in San Fran. San Fran, land of the Andreas fault line, Golden Gate Bridge, many gay people and Full House. Land of the no less than 20 degree weather, surfing and bleached blondes. Land of the - well, you get it.

The last time I spoke to her, she was thinking of switching into Linguistics but totally bailed on it when she realized that Linguistics had more to do with syntax and sound than with the socio-economic and anthropological backgrounds of the language, which is what she was looking to gain. So she decided to take Economics as her major, which sounds drab and commonplace , but of course it's not because she's at Berkeley.

So she's taking a course called Crisis Development, being taught by an actual memeber of faculty who's a UN ambassador. And the format of the class is as follows. This brilliant ambassador bloke will state an international crisis; for example, the president of a major country gets shot. Every person in the clas sthen gets assigned a role in the internation community. Thus, someone could be a CNN reporter, the vice president to the late President, a leader of neighbouring or trade relations country, head of the UN, etc. Then they have debates, convene at summits and UN headquarters and discuss a strategy to calm the masses, to implement on the country, and the social, economic and political consequences of their decisions.

I don't know about you, but I think that sounds absolutely amazing. See, this. This is what I pictured university would be like; full of amazing classes and dynamic faculties, with life-changing experience. I'm envious of her, I'll admit, because she gets to meet people like Simon Hurst and the Guy Who Invented the Laser .

I know that in the grand scheme of things, no one need pity me and that this complaining is rather ungrateful of me, yes? I have the chance to even attend university and for that I'm humbled and grateful, and the experience must and can only be what I make out of it what I will. In other words, I must take my learning in my own hands.

But there is more to university than that. It is a lifestyle; it seems to be a mindset. This physical place somehow molded into a train of thought in my mind and the minds of others. You cannot run away from it: the studying is tied in with the people. The lifestyle is varied; that is, you can make of it what you want. If you want to party, you party. If you want to study, you study and if you want to do a little bit of both then you rely heavily on coffee and sparks notes.

I was talking to Ter and we were just bitching about the stupid people on her residence floor. It reminded me of how I myself hated not only where I lived but the people whom I lived with. And compared to Western, Waterloo was fairly tame. Yet I was still aggravated. I think I would've been the psychotic shoots-everyone kid if I had to be at Western. It's so strange, she told me, because everyone had basically been lying to her all her life. I understood. How was she to blame for being coaxed into loving this place, this notion of university? This living breathing revolutionary thought it had become through no fault of her own. People like us, we saw it as a light at the end of our very very dark tunnel, almost like a salvage and not quite as the prize but not a stepping stone either. More like a place of quenching the thirst, the restlessness. They told her she would meet like-minded people but maybe the fine print was, like-minded people provided you attend university in with your brain off and not inspect too closely.

I feel bad marginalizing because not everyone's brain is off, by any means. But a majority of the people I've had the neutral experience (or thorough displeasure) of meeting have been either completely unremarkable or so remarkably ridiculous so as to blip on my radar for their intense stupidity. It is rather unnerving, I sometimes (I lie: often) think that these people will someday be running countries and making grand decisions for the so-called betterment of society. I only can feel thorough distaste and then I feel guilty for feeling that because, really, it is this society that has caused them to be such mind-numbing idiots.

Then someone such as myself thinks, well, these kids are idiots, the mainstreamers, the engineers, the healthsci or environment kids but maybe there's a small collective underground group that keep to themselves, scholars who'd rather not be marred by the reps of The Others. It's all very hush-hush and the dark, artsy, underground thought appeals to me. And I even find them. But of course, like everything in university, this too requires closer inspection and is a play on the original words. I see, really, that their underground is more the basement of someone's house and their dark artsyness gives way to misinformed, ill-opinionated pretentiousness. I'm rather shocked at their naievety and am somewhat offended at how ignorant they are. In the end I grieve that I ever leant them that much credit and think, well I'd rathr be with the numbskulls anyway: they might not have an opinion but then that means you don't have to put up with the close-minded pretentious crap either.

The Amish have this ritual for 19 and 20 year olds. It's like a coming out or something. Before they transition for adolesence to adulthood, the ducklings are released into the wild so they can have as much promiscuous sex and alcohol as they want, experiment with drugs and the like and basically havea kickass life for one year before they return back to the homestead. Upon their return, most renounce those years as Satanic and move on to their quiet furniture building existence (joke XD) but some - few mind you - decide to head back to what we big city folk call "real life". This is almost like that....except without the hope of these people ever withdrawing.

So what exactly am I trying to say? A good many things here. I'm trying to say...I feel a little cheated, no matter how childish that sounds. I feel different; I am not like these other people who worry about whether a boy likes them or whether he'll call them or who wore what or what club event is going on. I feel very tired and bothersome when friends try to tell me about what she said or he said and why that matters at all. I really cannot seem to connect on the same points as others around me and perhaps that is my own fault for being too uppity in my arse. Perhaps not. It just...shocks me a little and I feel like a...blind, lost soul, grappling for the next crevice of rock to hold on to, to take the next step. I'm sad not because this is a lonely existence but because the Soul of this World seems to be entrapped in something else entirely.

When my friend from San Fran tells me about all these wonderful things she has the opportunity to experience I'm in awe but I'm jealous too. She attends an American University and so she has a broader base, a wider spectrum with which to confer from. I'm bordering on attending three universities by now and I have to say that the experience is pretty much the same, with varying degrees of insanity. There is no depth, there is no importance; there is only frustration and anger at the atmosphere. There is a sense of loss and sense of detachment. I just felt like...this was supposed to be it. It was supposed to be the centre of my world, an overprivileged slice of real life. People looked forward to high school, I looked forward to second year university.

And besides Queens and Western, universities are pretty effing ugly.

Silent Letter

You don't know the first thing about me. It sounds like a stupid regular cry of a spoilt white suburban teenager but for me, its a truth. It's a cold hard truth that isn't meant to be shouted and then followed by a slamming door and pumping up my hard rock punk tunes. For me, its a resounding statement that haunts me and follows me everywhere I go. Like a thin shadow upon the ground that is there, day or night, light or no light. But you could never understand this. Because, once again, you've misjudged me, misgauged me.

I go through every day trying to do my best, trying to so hard to stay awake and just battle that monster that rears its ugly head the moment my eyes pop open. I try to be as sincere and dilligent as possible and always try to be agreeable or, if I can't be that, be quiet and indifferent to you.

But if you knew me, you'd be able to see this in every action that I take. Of course, you don't know the first thing about me so, for some reason unbeknowest to me that leaves me absolutely perplexed, you just assume the worst of me. And then you stupidly wonder why I don't tell the truth: because of your immature, horrible, vengeful, vindictive, childlike attitude concerning things of this nature.

For instance, if you knew me, you'd know that I love to see love around me but cannot commit to anything relationship-wise for the life of me. You'd understand that I have a palette for the finer things in life, can understand movies of great and subtle context. You'd realize that I appreciate these wisps, these moments of life and that I'm an observer who understands people, body language and life far greater than you realize. That I can understand and predict outcomes of peoples emotional scopes, and have deeper mental understanding of their behaviours on a more...spiritual, "fate-driven", intangible, philosophy of life context. You'd know that I'm sensitive and my sensitivity causes me to be far too emotional and very empathetic; I can feel people's sorrow, their joy and pain in levels that you could never even imagine because even words elude those depths. You'd be able to comprehend that I'm just different, that I live in my own shell, that I process my thoughts and understandings in a way different from those around me. "Those people", being people typical of my age. I'm atypical but this is neither good nor bad. It just is; thank you machiavelli.

If you understood even one tiny detail about me, you'd be able to see that everytime I cannot make you happy or fail at something you want, I have anxiety attacks, cannot think straight and the latter eats up at me for several days. I cannot get up, cannot function or think clearly. The word is depression, I am depressive and it takes me all my effort to keep my head above the water. For you. Because, as you've already proven years ago, that sort of understanding is beyond your emotional intelligence and capability, to handle, you who want everything simple and easy and bottom-lined. You'd also know that when I prayed for my marks to come out the only thing I kept saying was, please don't let them be hurt because of me.

I don't understand. I don't understand what I'm doing wrong. Okay, I can't articulate my feelings as coherently as I'd like but that is your own fault: everytime I tried when I was younger, you either rudely cut me off or scoffed at my flowered words as though they were something fruity and bookish, too high-level to be sincere and almost surreal in their reality. Too pompous, too idealistic and filmy. But those were the words of my heart and I couldn't get you to understand then. And now that I try and mould them for your sakes, I still cannot get my point across.

Which then leads me to this, the inevitable. By doing what you want, I am miserable as it is but you too cannot appreciate that I'm doing it for you. Instead, you berate me and grate on my nerves. Instead of encouraging me and putting a hand to my head to shield me from the elements you think reverse psychology will work. Here's a newsflash: talking in a ridiculing manner about my already low self esteem and trying to point everything WRONG with me and doing it in a disbelieving, vindictive manner is not going to help me. It's just going to lower my already pretty shitty self worth which I have been trying for 3 years now to rebuild.

So what is my final decision, my conclusion in these chain of events? I quickly realize that doing what I don't want to do, for your sakes leaves me unhappy as it is, that goes without saying, but also doesn't serve it's initial purpose: it doesn't make you any nicer or more encouraging or more loving. You are not proud or pleased. The outcome is neither good or bad; it is nothing. And that is even worse than the alternative. That nothing gets any better. Ever.

I can now only afford to scoff at your explanation of "she's only doing this to take the easy way out" because I've tried to convey in words the sincerity of my actions. Just because I never shared with you my hopes and dreams and wants with you before doesn't mean that they haven't been there all along, hiding from you. Just because I now bring them up with such fierce conviction means only that I've finally found the courage and spine to be able to look at my life and say, No, you are under my control and I will be happy no matter what.

Anyhow, the conclusion: the final result is this. I decide, to hell with that; it doesn't seem to be making any difference to you but more importantly, it doesn't seem to gel with me either. Then why this sacrifice for no results? Why bear the burden if no one, not even those you love, will at least commend you for it? Why? For honour? For respect?

Fuck honour. I'm fucking sick of honour. For respect? I have clearly not gained one ounce of respect by doing the right thing that you wanted me to do. Why continue? So that both parties be miserable? Doesn't it only make sense that one party should sink it all in, go the full monty, deal with the extra, marginal unhappiness by the other party and be happy themselves? If I have to be happy and do what I want, I might as well do it, because it doesn't seem to make much difference to you. And hey, so your opinion of me dips lower. Who the fuck cares. Honestly, I'm already in so deep, what's a little more? At least, that way, one of us is happy. And the most important thing is, this chain of resentment, this firewall of temper and dissatisfaction and anger toward everything you have done in my past will finally be broken.

I regret so much, cry over so much that happened, blame you for so much. But that was when I was younger: I had no control over it. But now...now I'm older. I do have control now. I don't want to feel any resentment, I don't want to blame you for something I could have changed.

The truth is, I did it for all the wrong reasons. I expected happiness to come from expectation. I expected it. That was wrong. Goals are important, but expectations only curb and curtail ones full creative powers. For once in my life, I felt successful. I felt loved. I felt like a normal, prodigal child. I saw that I had the power to make you smile in pride, to make you realize that I too was worth something, that I had capabilities that you had never imagined and that, where words had failed to convey, my actions were leaving you speechless instead. And oh my, was that power heady. It was something that I had never wielded, never even seen in myself before. Sure, others had them and I envied them so very much. But to be able to feel that power, to be able to have it...I cannot even explain what it meant to me. And how dangerously illusatory it made the entire situation.

I know now: I should not have done it to make you happy. I only made myself unhappy in the process. And now you're even more disappointed. I should not have lied to myself and told myself that I'm capable of this and that and things of which I have absolutely zero interest in. I should have let you seen me for who I am, should have let you know that whatever I am, I am me and that you will just have to accept that. But firstly, I should have been able to accept that. I should not have compartmentalized; you see, one part was me, the me I saw and knew. And then there was the me whom you saw and thought you knew, took for granted and assumed. I should have let the me me bleed into the you me. First, I should have been okay with me. Only then could I have expected you to come to terms with it.

And besides...what is so bad about me, anyhow? Okay, so I have a drop-of-a-hat temper. I'm stubborn. I have a superiority complex. At times, I'm arrogant, brash, unrealiable, sort of clumsy, impatient, a tad unaccepting, a little judgemental. But that is just me. For example, it's taken me a long time but I have now come to terms with the fact that you are vindictive, mean-spirited, childish, immature, uncomprehending, egotistical, and arrogant, and ever-ready for a fight or provocation. And that nothing I do will ever change our relationship. But there's good in me, too.

I try, so hard, I'm sincere and disciplined and somewhat righteous (for the moralistic things that matter, anyhow). And there are so many good things about you, too. Why do you always assume the worst of me and question my integrity? I've told you this from day one, the one thing I've shared is this: I absolutely hate, hate, hate it when you question my integrity, my intentions. Nothing flares me up more. No genocide or hate killings or massacres or anything gets me more riled than when you question my motives, especially when I'm trying to stick to and do the right thing.

God, I have more to say but it's all a broken record. I'm so tired of this bullshit. And I'm so tired of waiting for life. Ever since I can remember, since I was eight or seven, there's always been a Greek chorus in my head: just a little further, and it will get better. Just a little further, and it will get further?

But no. How much further? I'm not being impatient, I'm being realistic. When I was 8, I wanted to be 12 so I could dress the way I wanted to. When I was 12, I wanted to be 16 so I could drive and get the fuck away from you. When I was 16, I wanted to be 18 so I could finally leave this fucking shit hole, the depression, the anger, the guilt and get back to reality and live on my own terms. And now that I'm 18...all I want to do is have a hole open up and swallow me. All I wanted at 18, was to be 25 and graduated so I could start living life. But wait. At 25, I'd start wishing that I was 27 and had all my loans paid off while working in stuffy, shitty cubicle in some high pompous firm with insincere, single-minded, depthless, money-mongering idiots who cared only about their stock benefits and the newest cars. And then at 27, I'd wish I was 29 so I could finally earn a degree doing what I wanted to and then wish I was 30 so those loans from my second "epiphany, quarter-midlife crisis" degree could be paid off, again. And when I was 30, I'd probably have an anuerism or go insane and hang myself or put a gun to my head. And the worst part is, I'd constantly be living, waiting for the next thing to come. And I'd blame you for it.

You say you can see 10 steps into the future and anticipate things. Then why can't you anticipate this? Why can't you see all this falling apart, all of me falling apart? That I'm so lost and so confused because you've instilled into me a fear of life and the unknown consequences that are automatically always bad? Why do you make me feel guilty for feeling happy? Why do you make me think that just because I'm happy one day, that I must be quiet and sober the next day or else I'm frivolous and wasting life? Why is showing that happiness and feeling that happiness wrong? Why do you think that just because I show and feel happy, I'm automatically careless and childish and don't think seriously enough about the future. Why must my happiness be rationed and measured so carefully and labeled when there's precious little of it in my life in the first place? Why do I let you get in my head? Why can't you see that everything I've done, I do, I've done it for you?

Because you don't know. You don't know the first thing about me.