  "And you can't fight the tears that ain't coming, Or a moment of truth in your lies. When everything feels like the movies, Yeah, you bleed just to know you're alive..." ~ Iris by the Goo Goo dolls Troubled.
Paranoid. Insane. These are all words I'd use to describe the pathetic quivering mass of flesh that I have become. I... I just don't know anything anymore. My life seems to have pulled from my desperate grasp; the sand continues to fall between my scrambling fingers to be lost somewhere beneath me. This world is full of broken hourglasses. It seems I've finally lost my way. My frayed nerves have me hearing voices again, muffled but there, mumbling things that only I can hear.
They frighten me, they create a schism within me too wide to cross or close. What am I to do when I'm being pulled from all directions? Everything has gotten out of control, my life is not my own. I can't keep up with my classes, and that in itself is a disaster. I want my future to be full of options-- damn good ones, too-- but if I don't get my grades up again, I may never see the paths I need layed before me.
But everything is so hard, every test mind-numbingly difficult. Procrastinated homework has piled up on me, stacked high on a brittle foundation and threatening to collapse upon my head, threatening to smother the life from me. Friends, enemies, it's so hard to keep track of what arguments were my fault. I'm edgy around everyone, especially those I care about-- my closest friends-- I can't keep up with their enthusiastic optimism. People wanting things from me, all these wonderous things that I can no longer give, I have nothing left.
I had a feeling I'd been scraping the bottom of the barrel for quite some time now, but I never knew... I never knew this was how empty I was. For a while, I had one small escape: my art. I could draw whatever I wanted, only to escape for a while into a world where I decided the pressures and restrictions. I could vent my pent-up anger, my loneliness, my fear. I basked in the praise I got when people looked over my shoulder to see what I was doing, I loved the attention. It was a way to heal my wounds and build my self-confidence a bit. It was a wonderful release. But my flaccid fingers couldn't hold it. Durring the Disney trip, our orchestra pulled the best members of our band and (literally) forced them to attend a clinic instead of going to MGM studios.
The band was enraged. Furious. Livid. We threw a fit, but hell, there was nothing we could do. We were like a breeze against a brick wall. The administration would not be moved. So, we attended the clinic, and it was downhill after that. The soloist, whom we had the "privilege" of working with, definately had a majorly spiky tree UP HIS ASS !!
The man was a total dick, completely pompus and the whole situation made me sick. His solo piece, The Flight of the Bumblebee had barely any brass; hell, I only had ONE note in the entire song (Keep in mind, we're wasting valuable MGM time at this clinic and the faster we finish the sooner we get to go to MGM). The soloist had tempo problems, but refused to watch the directer, and the directer decided that he didn't care.
He'd make us play it over and over again, but with only one note, I never played. It was tedious, and I hated it. We all hated it. Unfortunately, we worked on the same few measures for FIVE HOURS . The clinic should have been done in an two hours, tops. In order to vent my rage, as I normally do, I drew pictures. Pictures on the inside of my folder. Pictures that depicted a certian band directer (Stick-figure versions, of course; not up to my usual caliber but anything else would have been far to gory) getting stepped on, squished, cut in half, and set on fire.
Harmless, silly doodles that no one should have ever seen. And I wasn't the only participant, a few others had their hand in 'expressing their emmotions' on my folder durring those agonizingly long five hours. After the clinic was over we rushed out, relieved, and I shut the pictures away.... I never expected anyone to find them and read the scrawled labels beneith them. So, now, I'm facing suspension from school, even expulsion for these half-assed doodles. They think I'd actually attempt to hurt a teacher?
I may be on the verge of insanity, but I am not stupid. I've never been in this much trouble. I've been a good student, diligent, quiet, respectful, attentive (usually), and always clean of these sort of messes. I hadn't meant anything by the drawings, I was frustrated and upset and hell, I'm young and stupid, remember? All we of the new generation are, our minds rotted by the evils of television and video games. Everything has continued in a downward spiral, I'm feeling more alone than ever before.
They even managed to take my art away from me. This wasn't the first time I had gotten in trouble for artwork of mine. Quite the contrary, actually, but there was only one other time that still rings so clear in my mind. I am ashamed to admit that when I was in kindergarten, I was crudely and cruelly violated by a male classmate.
I should not be ashamed --I had done nothing to merit this horror-- but he should. The next week, we were assigned to draw a monster, a scary monster, something we were afraid of. My monster had a penis. Because it was against school rules to draw such things, I was punished. For a while after that, the other children avoided me. What had made me do something as perverted to draw that ? I refused to say. Children... even now I'm surprised at the depth of even that simple drawing which no one understood. No one at all. And yet I was punished for it. My mother called earlier today and promised me that she and my father weren't mad, I wasn't in trouble with them, but their actions belied those words.
My father, usually pretty laid back, snaps at me, shouts at me, screams at me. He wanted me to take it seriously, he wanted me to understand what I already understood. I wasn't allowed to speak, because everything I said seemed to make him even angrier. So, I broke down. I cried like I was five years old. I cried like I haven't cried in so long. It's funny how fast parents forget promises, isn't it?
Lectures. I hate them. Sitting around that beat-up kitchen table, biting my lips nervously and feeling my eyes well up as they berated me over so many smaller things. I had no power in these lectures, my oppinion was always wrong. I cry now as I type these words, I hate feeling so helpless to defend myself. They twist my words, they yell, and I cry some more, until everything is too hysterical to continue and they release me to the comforting confines of my room.
I will recieve one tonight, no doubt, everything is awkward here. I'm walking on eggshells where ever I go, there's no where safe anymore. I'm always at a danger of doing something wrong, saying something wrong, getting myself into trouble. The voices murmer to me. I have nothing left, they have gripped me and ripped my posessions from my arms, everything I loved, everything I needed, all gone. The world has fallen around my ears, crushing me beneath its massive weight, but this time no one is there to help me. To survive, I must help myself . I am afraid. I am alone. I am broken. 
