New Years

“ I sleep too much. I’m here on Christmas vacation alone in the house with nothing to do (or so it would seem). I go to my bed at 8 o clock in the evening and sleep till noon. I am lazy. When I get up I contemplate getting dressed, then lie on the couch and watch TV for six or eight hours. I don’t even have the self-respecting decency to read or draw or write (three of my favorite things). No I plug my mind into the incessant drone of electricity, killing millions of brain cells for every second I sit growing blisters on my butt in three-day-old p.j.’s . it is my life out of school and it scares me. No it terrifies me, I dream of being an active person, a nice pretty-ish girl with a good mind traveling all over the world learning things seeing the wonders all around us. Meeting new people, no long-term relationships… a lot of one- nighters. Long term relationships scare me (not that I’ve had more than a month long one. Piff!). I am afraid of cages… anyway I want all these things but I see my life slipping away. What happened to the times when the most fun you could have was had outside? When you built forts, rode horses, laid in the grass to study the clouds. When did I suddenly decide to put blankets over my windows? Where does my dog get off to these days? Why is my bow sitting alone with its quiver of arrows?

I need help. That is all there is. I am a lonely godforsaken wretch, what am I doing holed up here even now in my bed writing. God I love writing… and reading too. They are my outlets. When I am alone and upset with my life I can escape into a book and become some one else, or I can write myself an entirely new life. But even so I can’t ignore the real world… at leas not entirely… someday I’ll be on my own. I can’t stay here forever…. And now in this moment of clarity , I see it… I don’t want to grow up. Not really, I want to stay this way forever, sure I hate my parents but fights keep me on my toes and make for great writing material. I don’t want to be out there by myself, paying bills sleeping with disgusting landlords to pay rent. I want to be here forever aggravating my English teachers, sneaking out of the house, writing stories and poems for websites that probably extort me. I want to see the quizzical look on librarians’ faces as I cart the maximum (25) amount of books into my car. I want to be stuck forever in my 98-dodge shadow, where after enough sneaking out I will eventually lose my virginity… suddenly I DO NOT want to grow up… but I know I have to… and that scares me. I have failed so many people and I don’t want to fail myself. I guess that means I have to get ready. I need to move…. Do something other than sit on my ass all day…..”

The clock reads 11:00 p.m. I look down at my scribbled monologue. Quite an awkward resolution I think. But then there have been more awkward ones I suppose, I have been up to long and I here my dog faintly snoring on the floor… to late to get online and submit I guess, have to do it tomarrow. Oh well. I scan the page over one last time before going to sleep… I talk too much.