Category: Junior Literary

I feel at some point we all have trust issues. I think of it as some type of rope and knife. Where every time someone does something to lose your trust, the rope becomes thinner and thinner.

Lately I’ve been struggling with trusting people due to my past experiences. I’d say I’ve been through many tragic events with family and even friends, and I’ve put up with stuff I shouldn’t put up with. But, I’ve grown from this and now have enough self love for myself to do what is best for me.

I think I need to learn to trust myself. I back out of many things solely because of my anxiety. Some days it was like I was my anxiety. Like it just overtook me entirely. This has caused me to miss out on so many things. And even though my anxiety has drastically gone down since being at MSA, it still seems to creep up on me sometimes.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, sometimes we don’t trust people because we don’t trust ourselves. And that’s up to you to change.

So many things are easier said than done, and it sucks.

I know when people give me advice, it’s because they have my best interest at heart, but so few understand how hard, and sometimes unrealistic their advice is.

“Just put yourself out there! Make new friends.”

I don’t remember making my friends that I have now. Most of the people I used to know, I had known since 6th grade. Making friends in elementary school seemed to happen like magic. In high school, I feel like I’m missing some special guide book that everyone else seems to have. I try and try, and I just keep coming up short. I’m missing out on a lot, and holding myself back. I’m worried for when college comes. My current plan is being in a sorority (I know it’s basic, but bear with me), which I’ll honestly end up making another blog post about sororities and my infatuation with being in one. I think being in a sorority would help me find a community, a sisterhood, if you will. My only current problem, is that they are extremely expensive, but I’ll find a way. For now though, I’m in high school, and sadly I can’t be in a sorority now. So that solution is invalid.

“Just get over it.”

I try. I try and I try, but it’s always in my mind. I don’t forget. The thought fills my brain like a sink, until it’s brimming the edge. Instead of spilling, it drains. Something will distract me for a fleeting moment, until it starts to fill up again. I can’t just forget. Maybe I’ll find something new to obsess over, but every once in a while it’ll come back to remind me.

“Just speak your mind/Say how you feel!”

I think that the way I feel is obvious, but I have to step back once in a while to realize that I have to project how I feel, to get the feedback I want. It’s been hard for me to realize that to get the help I need or any response at all, I need to be open. Again, easier said that done. I don’t like swallowing my pride.

“Just take one day at a time.”

Oof. Big big oof. I often look at the bigger pictures of thing, mostly relating to time. I count in weeks, not days. Weeks until I go home, weeks until Christmas, weeks until, weeks until, weeks until. It’s like a mantra. I think it’s easier for me to cope this way. We don’t measure long amounts of times in seconds, or usually we don’t. A minute seems a lot less daunting than sixty seconds. The same way that one week seems like less amount of time than seven days. Something that I also do, that I realize not everyone does, is counting in sleeps. During the Christmas season for example. When I was little, and honestly still now, I would count how many times I had to sleep, until it was Christmas morning. My child brain needed a way to simplify time.

Point of this blog, a lot of things are easier said than done. Just saying a solution, doesn’t mean that executing it is just as easy.

I have bad habits.

Some days, I will not do anything. It’s not because I’m lazy, but rather that I know I’ll start working TOO hard. Working on something for just one hour? Never heard of that. It doesn’t matter if it is 3 in the morning, I will work for hours on end.

Not on school work, of course. Cosplay.

At this point, just putting fabric next to me is a dangerous decision. I cannot be trusted with it. That curtain over there? boom. Now it’s a dress. That pillow? It’s now being used to stuff my sailor moon sleeves. Those black boots? Now they’re red. I can even turn plastic into armor if i need to.

 

To be honest, I don’t know how I got to this point. When I started back in 2014, it took me months to even sew a simple dress. Yet, this past weekend, I managed to do nearly an entire outfit within a day. Sure, now I know how to sew. Therefore, it’s easier to get stuff done. However, I don’t really remember anything from it. At one point I was cutting fabric, and then sewing, and suddenly is was 2AM. And I swear it was just 3PM a few minutes ago.

Maybe its the stress? I do put the ‘stress’ in seamstress.

This particular project is one that I’m very stressed about. In November, this lovely sailor scout will be presented alongside a group of 23 Sailor Moon characters. There’s no repeat of characters, so that means I got really lucky in having being picked to be one of the scouts. Especially this one. Of course the mains were the first to get chosen- Sailor Moon, Sailor V, Chibi Moon, ect… But still, they were going pretty fast. I had always wanted to cosplay Neptune, and thankfully I was able to grab that spot while it was still open.

The villains and background characters aren’t bad- don’t get me wrong. I just,,, I really wanted to be Neptune.

Excuse my face.

Anyways, once I got started on her, I just didn’t really stop. Some call that hard work. Others call it an addiction. I’ll let you decide.

In other news, when I went to go get fabric for this, I saw my friend! There’s an older lady named Jan that works at the Jo-Anns where I get my fabric. We always enjoy talking to each other. She’ll ask about my projects, We’ll talk about cats. Shes just my cool older friend that works across the counter.

And that was pretty much my whole weekend summed up!

So Monday, October 15, 2018 was our monthly coffeehouse, and that was interesting to say the least! The theme was “Under the Red Sky/dark fantasies”. All the poets on program and those that signed up were all great. I also read some poems, and I think one of them was equally liked and disliked. For those of you that didn’t attend Coffeehouse, I’m including my poems that I read. 

The first poem is titled “Red”, and I’m not exactly sure what made me write it. But please do enjoy it!

Red

The sky looks like a pulsing heart,
pulled fresh from someone’s chest.
The pink clouds pass slowly, appearing to be forever stuck.

Below the bright red sky, chaos ensues.
Blood spills.
Heads roll.
Death rules.

Humans attack each other on the streets.
Siblings turn against siblings.
Wife against husband.
Father against son.
Homes are ruined, forever stained with red.

The red sky weeps red tears.
The moon gives the world a red tint.

Everything is red.
The ground is soaked with the blood.
The grass is no longer green on the other side –
It’s red.

Now, the second piece is titled “Monster”. This is piece that probably received mixed reactions from the crowd, but I still enjoy it and find it… amusing? It’s up to you to determine. Also, there’s tad bit of gore involved, so you’ve been warned!

Monster

The monster doesn’t live under the bed.
The monster doesn’t live in his basement.
Or in his attic.
Or in his closet.

The monster is freely moving.
He comes and goes.
He steals the screams of children and adults alike.
He takes the form of his greatest nightmares,
and makes it so real, he considers gouging out his own eyes.

He can’t handle the sight.
The smell.
The sounds.
His body shakes and trembles.
The monster stalks closer.

“You’ll never escape me, Johnny.”
“Yes, Papa.”

Blood coats the walls.
Mama’s head is bashed open, her brains become the new carpet.
The smell of her rotting flesh perfumes the air.
Her life essence drips from the head of the hammer.

“She tried to escape, Papa.”
“Good, Johnny. You’re learning.”

Johnny was the monster.
Papa was the monster.
And they’ll make you into a monster too.

That “Johnny.. Yes Papa” thing was a complete coincidence. I’ve never actually watched those videos, but those were the names that I picked while typing. Oops.

It hurts worse when I talk to you.

Why won’t you just leave me alone?

You don’t want me to hate you.

Well, I don’t want to love you,

and if I don’t hate you,

then I will.

I am so tired.

Exhausted.

I want to sleep you away.

But when I wake up you are still in my head.

I wish I could just forget you,

all of the pieces,

everything I learned.

I don’t think those memories are worth this pain.

I haven’t cried in days,

but you say one word to me,

and here I am.

I’m so ready to be over you.

It hurts you are over me.

I want to be done.

I want to have the strength to not answer.

I want to have the strength to not talk to you.

I cant keep doing this.

I can’t.

 

I swing left to right as the foot inside the boot that I am connected to makes it way across the gravel. The pebbles look up at me with hateful expressions as the heel of the boot shifts down to push them deeper into the dirt. I can hear the minerals beneath me roll, clash, and even bust under the pressure. Of course, they hate me. They spend their lives on the ground, waiting to be stepped on a buried. I can only imagine how they see me. Up here, jumping around without a care in the world. It’s not true though. No, not at all.

I am actually terrified. Every day the wind tugs me side to side, and I can feel the tough leather material of the boot rubbing my back as I scrape against it. I can smell the staleness of sweat around this human’s ankle. It slowly makes my hinge rust. Every day I become more and more worn and tethered. I was once stark black but after months of repeating the same routine, my paint began to chip. Now, I’m almost entirely silver. This human is now finding herself in frustration every morning because of the struggle to move me up the teeth of the zipper.

There are so many things that can go wrong up here, and there is no way to predict when any of it will happen. I’m getting old, and with age comes breakage. Soon enough my rusted hinge will erode enough to break me off. Then what? I’m left to be washed away and forgotten. That thought haunts me. I would absolutely hate to spend the rest of my days not seeing nothing more than the bottom shoes and the sky. I guess in that sense, I’m scared to live like the pebbles. It must be so unsatisfying.

It could be worse. This human could just give up on this old boot and bury us away with the rest of her “favorite shoes”. I have spoken to the ones that came before me. They all say the closet is a forsaken place. They never see the light. They live in eternal darkness. Oh! How terrible that must be, to not just be stuck looking at the same thing, but forevermore be blind to the world outside. That is my worst nightmare. I couldn’t bear that kind of life.

So, to the pebbles, I wish to inform you that my life isn’t all that great either, and my future may possibly be equivalent to yours or perhaps worse. I may be swinging above you, but just because I am higher up, doesn’t mean I’m any better off. I hope that, if I fall, I do not fall into your enraged mouths. Instead, I hope that we can find peace and understanding to these grudges that you hold against me. I mean no harm. I’m just fulfilling my purpose.

 

Name: Legal

Age: Still alive

Status: Upper lower class in Colonial America

Occupation: Former Miss America applicant.

Hair: Wack

Clothes: Wack

Way I don’t even smile: wack

They always tell you to find the McDonald’s in the woods, but where are the woods? and is McDonald’s truly real? Our lives are filled with metaphors, McDonalds being perhaps conceived as being possibly of the status of state of mind which can also be, but never truly be, and with each can not just, but also with excessive force be thought of as that which is of the way of life and which we live in it. The Burger of Peace being one such example.

Metaphorically, we all have tortilla chips. sometimes they are in our heart, sometimes they are in our hands. However, we truly struggle when they are stuck in our esophagus. The esophagus in this case being hard times. Many times before have i been spotted weeping in the Taco Bell, and its not just because there’s beans in my ketchup. There’s no need to sweat the beans in your ketchup. It’s always the sharp and salty metaphorical tortilla chips. their jagged edges cutting into your inner flesh, like a fish in an odd situation in which that would happen.

But there is more to life than our metaphorical tortilla chips. they make us strong, but they do not define us. we have to find our own McDonald’s in the woods. This will truly help us, not only to be, but also to not be in the situation of which can not only help, but truly discover the things which, in the right context, can help me find that which is of the both helpful and great ways of life.

Fryers are burns, but ice is cold. this can also be taken in many ways. for some, the fryers are people. the ice is crushed. Together, you can preserve a body. However, hopefully you’re not in that situation. The fire of the fryer can be hot, and can burn like a flame for a while. Yet, there is no balance without the ice.  We never want our fryers to take over us fully.

There is no correct way to interpret this, but there isn’t an incorrect way either. What is your fryer? What is your ice? What are your beans? What are your metaphorical tortilla chips? What is your social security number? Where is your McDonald’s in the woods? Why do you weep in the Taco Bell?

 

This blog will be about my experience with realizing and getting over some things. I took the time to find Peace in the Valley.

In the midst of the all of the drama, the mess, the misunderstandings, the confusion, and the pain, I knew I had to get it together. The only way I was going to be able to do that was to accept some things for what they were. Nicki Minaj said something that inspired me and showed me “the light”. She said,” People will love you and support you, when it’s beneficial.” As I thought back on the times that I felt like I was done wrong, that is exactly what had happened. As long as I was there to help them, everything was fine. But, as soon as I needed them, they were gone. 

It is gonna hurt, really bad, but never give people the power to alter your lifestyle in any way, shape, form, or fashion. You have to find yourself and stay secure in who you are. Never let anyone make you wonder about yourself. Do not get me wrong, in every situation there is a lesson, whether it be good or bad. But, those lessons are meant for you to become stronger, not lose yourself. 

Sometimes it takes some mental, physical, and emotional healing. Mentally because when things happen to us, we tend to overthink the other person’s intentions or our response. So, we have to stay calm and come to terms that everything will be fine. Physically because it is not only a stress reliever, but a healthy way to let it all out. The movements and stretches of the body and limbs help a lot. Pushing yourself helps tremendously. And emotionally because at times, we find ourselves spiraling down when it comes to being stable enough to handle certain things. We have to make sure that we are not allowing anything or anyone to degrade our values, as people. 

Peace leads to rest. Rest leads to energy. Energy leads to hard work. Hard work leads to success. Success leads to happiness. Happiness leads to an everlasting feeling of relief. Don’t allow people, no matter who it is, to degrade you. You know what you want out of life. When you get it, you be proud of it. People will try and make you someone you are not. Allow yourself room to celebrate the accomplishments for yourself. 

 

I have been working on a new song. I wrote the basis of this shortly after my break up when I was at a really low point. These lyrics convey how I felt on those nights when I couldn’t sleep, when I wondered what I did wrong. This is still a work in progress, also it sounds better when it is sung, but these are the lyrics:

---

There’s a hole inside my heart,
it’s killing me, it’s tearing me apart.
There are bricks inside my chest
they weigh me down, won’t give me any rest.

 

I’m not saying my heart isn’t breaking
every time I look into your eyes
I’m not saying my soul isn’t shaken,
an aftermath of all of your lies.

I hate to say it, but you can’t kiss me anymore.
I hate the way that you taste when I’m not yours.
I just wish we could start over.

 

There are thoughts inside my head,
they keep me up, won’t give me any rest.
There are cracks within my bones,
it breaks me down to do this alone.

 

I’m not saying my heart isn’t breaking
every time I look into your eyes
I’m not saying my soul isn’t shaken,
an aftermath of all of your lies.

I hate to say it, but you can’t kiss me anymore.
I hate the way that you taste when I’m not yours.
I just wish we could start over.

---

Those are the first two verses and choruses. I will probably add some type of bridge in the near future. I’m super proud of myself for getting back into song writing because I had honestly dropped it for a while and I’m not sure why. It’s my favorite outlet for how I feel about things, and I think it is because it combines both of my passions. Thanks for reading!

I’m not sure about you guys, but I’m enjoying October so far. Not so much the school aspect, but everything else is great.

Ice Nine Kills has released their new album, The Silver Scream, and I must say, it is fucking bomb. I love it so much, and I’ve been listening to them everyday since last Monday in preparation for this album. All the songs are based on different horror movies like IT, The Shining, Friday the 13th, that’s just to name a few. And they’re all great. I recommend everyone listen to it, and some of their other songs like Hell in the Hallways or The People in the Attic, based on Stephen King’s Carrie and Anne Frank, respectively. It’s all great to me because of the stories behind the songs or the allusions made in them. INK’s album Every Trick in the Book was their experiment at creating songs from other media. And they perfected it to me. To true lovers of literature or movie buffs, some of their songs may seem to be a flop, but I give them all a solid 10. And it’s just in time for Halloween, making it so much better – a smart marketing tactic, if you ask me. 

The song A Grave Mistake resonates with me. It’s about The Crow, a movie where a man and his soon-to-be wife are murdered, however, his life doesn’t end there. On the anniversary of their death, the man comes back to avenge their deaths. Some reason, the song hits hard to me, with lines like “buildings burn and people die all of the time” and “you can’t save yourself/ or save your soul”. They may or may not affect others the same way they do for me, I guess that’s just your opinion. I’m not here to preach about the greatness of Ice Nine Kills or anything, I’m here to say “Hey, check this out. I think it’s pretty good, and I’d like it if you gave it a listen.” I didn’t say it like that to my best friend though… I demanded her to listen it, but that’s different! Anyway, those lines I mentioned before. I think they affect in such a way because of how blunt it is. Buildings do burn and people do die. It happens daily and there’s nothing you can do to stop it. Same thing for saving yourself. You can try your best to not bring yourself closer to your end, but there are some things that can’t be prevented. It’s simple as that. I think that may be the point of the song: to show how helpless we are against life. With that being said, I’m gonna leave a couple of links to the songs mentioned and to the album. Please do give them a listen!

A Grave Mistake – The Crow

Hell in the Hallways – Carrie

The People in the Attic – Anne Frank

The Silver Scream

Go listen. Or else…