Conversations With My 13 Year Old Self

So, I never wanted this to be a blog where I would bitch about my life. In fact, I wanted this to just bitch about everything but my life. However, this one time, I think I'll bitch. I was listening to P!NK (and anyone who knows me really well knows how much I love P!NK) and Conversations With My 13 Year Old Self came on.

Conversations with my thirteen year old self. Conversations with my thirteen year old self. You're angry, I know this. The world couldn't care less. You're lonely, I feel this. And you wish you were the best. No teachers or guidance and you always walk alone. You're crying at night when nobody else is home. Come over here and let me hold your hand and hug you, darling. I promise you that it won't always feel this bad. There are so many things I want to say to you. You're the girl I used to be. You little heartbroken, thirteen year old me. You're laughing, but you're hiding. God, I know that trick too well. You forget that I've been you and now I'm just the shell. I promise I love you and everything will work out fine. Don't try to grow up yet. Ooooh, just give it some time. The pain you feel is real. You're not asleep, but it's a nightmare. But you can wake up any time. Don't lose your passion or the fighter that's inside of you. You're the girl I used to be. The pissed off, complicated, thirteen year old me. Conversations with my thirteen year old self. Conversations with my thirteen year old self. Until we meet again, oh I wish you well. Ooooh, I wish you well, beautiful girl. Oh, I wish you well until we meet again. My little thirteen year old me.

Basically, I love this song for every reason why I love any song that I love (if that makes ANY sense). I can relate to it. You know that question that your grade eight teacher asks you at the end of the school year? "If you could go back in time and talk to yourself at the beginning of this school year, what would you tell yourself?"? This song is my answer.

When I was thirteen, my mother was going through a rather horrid divorce. It was rough (as I learned a few years later), and Mum slipped into a depression. Understand that my mother was twenty-two when she had me and was a single mother. So, during her depression, she seemed to resort to a teenage standard and would lock herself in her bedroom with her computer 24/7. Lie I do not. She would only come out for the bathroom or if she were thirsty. Sometimes she wouldn't even come out when she was thirsty and would instead call me over and ask me to get her something to drink, which I always would.

For about a year and a half, I was the adult. I was thirteen years old, turning fourteen in May (a birthday she swears she remembered, but didn't) and was already struggling with school and homework, but on top of all that, I had to make sure the house was clean so we wouldn't be thrown out, make sure Mum and I were both fed for all three meals of the day, and also make sure that I was still passing my classes. Luckly, the depression started during my summer break, so the stress didn't mount until part way through my eighth year, where I was already having issues with my teacher (who I, at the time, thought hated me but she was just really trying to push me harder because she knew I could do better, which wasn't fucking helping AT ALL under the circumstances).

My teacher found out, eventually, what was going on. Truth be told (because, really, what else am I doing in this entry?), I crumbled one day and she pulled me aside during recess and I spilled the basics (which is all you guys are getting too, but still) of what my then-current situation was. She suggested that I start talking to the school counsellor. I agreed to give the idea a try and then Mrs K said that she would have to get my mother's permission for it. I almost freaked the fuck out. Now, I don't freak the fuck out normally. Like, it takes a LOT to make me freak the fuck out. But the thought of my TEACHER telling my MOTHER that she thought I needed counselling for all the stress I was under made me want to slice my wrists open with a plastic spork, and I always think that doing that would be STUPID, so what does that tell you about how I was feeling THEN?

Mrs K was cool about it; she said that she would tell Mum that it was because of the divorce and nothing else. I made her swear on it and then re-agreed to the plan. Of course, Mum said yes. She then said to me, 'keep me out of this; this is about you, not me, OK?'

"I'm doing this BECAUSE of you!" was my inside-voice thought to that. She still doesn't know that. I don't think I'll ever tell her.

The counsellor thing didn't work out well. I don't like talking about my feelings. And I don't like people. Or strangers. So telling my feelings to a person who was a stranger was NOT the best way to go about things.

I found some safety in writing. I've mentioned that Jo Rowling was the one who really got me into writing; this is half true. She was my safety net. It started where I would just drown in the Potter books and manage to fall asleep in the middle of a chapter because I had relaxed enough that I finally shut down after the day from burning hell. Then it moved to having read the first four books hundred times each (no word of a lie) and the fifth one at LEAST fifty, and then the sixth one about twenty-five. Because the sixth one was the one with a lot of possible outcomes, I was assaulted (like a peanut!) by the ideas and I started to write.

Like everything, I got better at writing with practise. And I got a LOT of practise, believe you me. It was, and remains, my escape from the world. And it has now become my passion in life. And anyone who knows me well knows that if I'm passionate about something, it means a lot to me. Ask JD or Shelly; we've known each other basically our entire lives.

I just had to get this down. Not many people understand why I am the way I am. I'm half adult, half child, because I never really got to transition into a teenager and then from there, into an adult. I had to skip being a teen and immediately be the adult. It sucks, at times, because I was weird to begin with, so skipping a vital part of my life made me even weirder. There are times when I still have to be the adult I shouldn't be yet, and there are times when the child part still comes out. I used to cry at every little thing that went wrong, but now I hardly ever cry. I had to train myself to tough it out and bite back all the tears.

I've been so afraid to stand my ground, so I simply shut my mouth, close my eyes, bite my lip and swallow every tear. - Sorry For Myself? by Jann Arden

Hell, I really can bitch once I get started, huh? I never truly bitch, though, so I guess I had a shite load built up. But I never bitch without having a solution, and this is it:

I'm moving to Scotland. Plain and simple. Well, not SIMPLE, but it's plain. Sort of. My life is so fucked right now that I feel like I've been thrown back six years. Mum works all day, Dad (second and last husband) is unemployed and plays World of Warcraft all day. I do everything. Until I got a job. I still do ALMOST everything, but at least it's not on days that I work. My job is my escape. And thank God that it's with such amazing people or I would have just up and left. No word of a lie. I really am lucky that I managed to snag the job I have because I would probably have packed up my shit and left.

So I'm working with awesome (in both definitions of the word) women who are funny and make life bearable at a job that I thought I was underqualified for, getting paid my own money which I will save up until I have more than enough to get the FUCK out of here, rent a flat and get a job in Scotland, then buy my plane ticket out of here. Start fresh. Have my own life, because I feel like I'm living the life that my mother wanted for herself.

I think I missed that part. Both of my parents are writers. My mum has been a writer since before I was born. And I always admired how Mum dealt with everything in life and used to want to be just like her. Which included being a writer. But after everything that went on, I still admire her, but I no longer desire to be just like her. The writer thing started as that, but now it's because I know I'm pretty decent at it, and I just really would love to get something published other than some poem I wrote in eleventh grade that was really a fluke that I thought was a piece of shite but actually got into the Young Writers of Canada book of verse. I still have no idea how THAT happened, but moving on.

I need to get out of Toronto. I never really WANTED to be here. I just knew that it would be a bazillion times better than Brampton ever was or ever could be. Hell, I just need to get out of CANADA. I'm bored of being here. Hopefully, once I've gotten all the money I need, JD will be able to come with and help me find a place. And Amanda (a friend and peer) said that she would help me if I promised to travel around Ireland with her. She drives a hard bargain (/end sarcasm) and she sounded sincere. We'll see what happens; it would be wonderful to have more than one person there with me, since I have no relatives in Edinburgh, Scotland. But still, I need to plan some more things, but I'll be on top of everything.

Alright, I'm through for now. My apologies for this asston of writing and if you made it this far, I less-than-three you for sticking with me. Night.