happy 18th birthday to me

The clock struck 12 about an hour and a half ago. The day I never thought would come, the day that always seemed so far away, that day is finally here. So please will someone tell me why I can’t stop all these tears from running down my face.

I don’t know how I got here and I don’t know how this happened. Just the other day I started middle school and then a couple days after that I started high school, and now I’ve been in college for almost a month. It all sounds so exciting but the whole thought of the unknown is so frightening to me. Why am I here? How do I learn who I really am? How am I supposed to figure it out when everyone keeps being so loud. I can’t even hear my own thoughts sometimes..maybe that’s why I stay up to late at night when it’s almost morning and the only sound I can hear is the resonating ticking of the clock.

Tick.. Tock… Tick…

I am excited for the future.. and for rolling around in my new human sized hamster ball.

Yes, I am actually 18 now.

I love you too Mom but I can’t breathe!?

 

You can’t possibly tell the person who carried you around for 9 months, who endured labor pain for you, who raised you, who spent thousands and thousands of dollars on you, who bought you that doll you saw at the store when you were young and really liked, who bought you that brand new car you wanted when you graduated high school, who gave you a life that other kids could only dream of, that person, that incredible woman whose place no one could possibly take, the person who has supported you your whole life, and the only person who demonstrates true unconditional love for you; you can’t just tell that person to leave you alone, or that you need space.

What space!? I’m sure she wanted space when I was rapidly growing inside of her…But it’s just time for me to have some independence. By independence I mean doing my own laundry or not having to see my mother every day…maybe 1 text message per hour instead of 30…something alone those lines.

“You’re gonna miss me when you leave!!”

“You’re gonna miss my cooking!!!”

“You’re gonna miss your room being clean all the time!!”

 

Yes.. I  will miss all those things. But I kind of want to? I want to grow up mom, but I don’t wanna hurt your feelings Mama. 

I’m going off to college soon, and I thought I had made the right decision by deciding to attend state public school and taking advantage of my full scholarship/reserved spot in medical school plus living stipend, but maybe I should have gone to California and paid $60,000 a year, maybe it would have been worth it to not hear about how you are going to come visit me every weekend. 

No…not worth it, but still. 

As my move in date is approaching, my mom keeps talking about how she is going to come stay at her house in the city where my university is, just so that I can stay with her the whole time she’s there. I mean, I wouldn’t mind doing it every once in a while, but the first weekend I’m there!? I was planning on going to a concert…but dinner and a movie with you and dad sounds great too.

“You don’t wanna see us…?” She says sadly when I am not ecstatic about her plan of frequent visits.

“Of course I am, Mommy,” I reply quickly when I think of the dream.

Ohhh the dream. 

Haunting both my mom and me since 2007:

“I had a dream about you- you were in college. Please don’t let it come true.”

“Mom I’m in middle school…”

“But it was so real!! Please don’t ever let it come true!! Please!”

“Mom I’m like 10 I’m not going to college till like forever,”

“Don’t ever let it come true!!! Please, for me. Don’t ever let it come true!!”

I remember thinking it must have been pretty bad because she was freaking out so badly.

It was your birthday. I went and bought you all these presents and I baked you a cake. I didn’t tell you I was coming- I wanted to surprise you. I stood in front of your last class of the day waiting for you smiling ear to ear with my stomach flipped up-side down by the excitement swarming around inside me. I see you walk out the door and come closer and closer and then you see me…but you don’t smile. “HAPPY BIRTHDAY!” I exclaimed. “Mom what are you doing here,” you replied. “I made plans with my friends, why are you here,” you asked.

“Okay stop.”

“You felt so bad when you got to your room and saw all your presents but I was already on my way home!!!!”

That part still makes my stomach drop, and 7 years later, I still feel guilt from something I never even did.

 

I love you way too much to ever not be happy to see you, Mama. 

Maybe just not every weekend…

Just kidding.

No but really, I’m not a kid anymore. I just wish you would realize it, but if you never do, then that’s okay too. 

The least I can do for everything you have done for me is let you love me.

Thanks for always being there for me; I’ll always be there for you, too.

 

And by the way, I promise I won’t make your dream come true. 

Riding in Lifeboats with Ghosts

i love this

hannah brencher.

With permission, I have posted the email below.

Afternoon Hannah,

I’m moving to Athens, GA in three weeks. I know absolutely no one. I’m taking out a loan to start graduate school after I worked so hard to pay my way through undergrad to be debt free. And I’m going into a field I’m not 100% sold out on. And when I leave this Texas town that I’ve called home for the past four years I’m leaving behind my best friend. Only, he doesn’t realize it. He ended our relationship right after graduation in May because he doesn’t have his life figured out and cannot ask me to wait around. We were friends before we ever dated and have remained friends even after. But for whatever reason, the guy who shared my common desire to talk deep things and look beyond the surface level, he isn’t that person anymore…not with…

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I quit my job today

I’m not a quitter, but I quit.

 

The expectations of being a lifeguard at the local pool during the summer:

laid back days, tan skin, sun-kissed hair, and a nice body. Even though you don’t work out..I mean, you’re a life guard..all life guards have nice bodies.

The reality of being a lifeguard:

Sun burns, hair that reeks of chlorine even after numerous shampoos, and dirty bathrooms.

 

As anyone who has been to a public pool knows, the pool’s bathroom is just about the most disgusting place on the surface of the earth. The floors are covered in water…i think…and toilet paper and paper towels are all over the floor, wet, of course, and everyone is barefoot and the smell…don’t even get me started on the smell.

Now imagine having to clean that..no worse, imagine having to clean it when no one ever does. Days and days of accumulated filth..

yuck.

You can imagine my reaction to a place like this after having spent last summer working at the indoor pool of a military school, where the bathrooms were cleaned by real janitors and they were cleaned hourly…yes, every hour, not week. Anyway, not only was my new work place not clean, but none of the employees seemed disturbed by the fact that it was nauseously dirty.

I thought I would look past this since I don’t have to be in the bathrooms at all, really, and that was the worst part of the pool. The rest of it appeared pretty clean. The trash on the deck of the pool was swept out into the middle of the parking lot everyday when the pool closed. Don’t worry though! No big deal, they told me it’s “just garbage.”

It was one of those jobs- I would go home, complain all night, wake up and do it all over again. I suppose every job is like that. I feel like I had it worse, especially since I was the new kid. Whatever, weeks went by.

Guess who had to unclog the toilet in the men’s restroom with the plunger that hasn’t been cleaned since last century?

the new kid.

Guess who had to stay after hours and sweep all the trash from the dock of the pool to the middle of the street because it’s “just garbage” and  that’s what the manager said to do

the new kid.

I was only employee there when the pool closed. The manager wouldn’t even look at me when I spoke to her. The facilities were disgusting. Anyway, point is I quit. And I’m no quitter, but I quit.

I haven’t regretted it yet!

I’m gonna be a tutor for the rest of the summer, I bet I won’t have to unclog any toilets doing that.

 

I have no idea what I’m doing, but on a separate note, it’s August?

It is one in the morning, and as I am laying here writing this, I find it reassuring that no one will see it…I hope. Maybe that defeats the whole purpose of a blog.. but at least for a while, and then when I’m ready, I will share it on social media for all my family and the friends I’ve made over the past few years to see.

I’m still trying to figure out how to do this.. so I will write, and if I enjoy it, I will keep writing, and then I will call it “blogging.”

Well, I  closed my eyes and opened my eyes, and yet, another summer has almost come to an end. Except unlike previous summers, this one was filled with all sorts of life changing events like going across the ocean and falling in love with a European, riding on the back of a dolphin in Mexico and zip-lining from tree top to tree top across the scenic state of Colorado.

No really…it all happened.

But probably the most significant life-changing event that occurred in the last three month was I graduated high school-yes, four years of drama, stress, and trying to find myself in the confined underground walls of the former bomb shelter they call a school are finally over. Next step, I pack my things, put them in the back of my new red and shiny Mini Cooper, and take them with me about 200 miles northwest from here to where I will spend what many people refer to as “the best time in life”

-college.

“Excited” is an understatement.