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if you really knew me?
have you seen these?!
familiar?

well…

if you really knew me

youd know i was there.
i had the scars. the diagnosis’. the absent and worthless parents. faced death. ”wanted it myself.” hated myself. the world. maybe even life.

no one ever looked. or listened. or asked.
and i was crying out.

what i saw around me everyday at school, what i heard constantly from the mouths of countless others in the halls or in my headphones, what i read on the internet or from the pages of our tortured teenage souls – all reinforced what i felt and thought in my head and heart.

i thought i knew everything.

the things i regretted were nothing. then, the things i regret now were works in progress. my skeletons in the closet were conceived and born then.

yet.

the mirrors shrink and purify themselves of the lipstick, paint, and pictures.

revealing the new but old familiar face. weve changed and grown and past the tumult once so obstructing the view.

we understand the children that we were. we realize the truth of life and its unrelenting, indistinguishable, unpredictability. we learn to embrace it so as to prevent its grasp from dragging us under. for the first time, we know a bit about ourselves. something that makes us comfortable. we feel balanced for a while. as if there is, in fact, something right with the world.

we remember that it isnt always easy. sometimes its horrifying, nasty, brutal, confusing, damn near impossible. millions of other things.

and we remember what it took to discover these things.

and to accept it.

and to move on.

we reflect on how silly we were. how wrong we were.

how far weve come.

how strange and beautiful this place.

to have once seemed so inhospitable, uninviting.

i want these kids to know that. i want to give them this message. in response to theirs. this is my storage place until i think over and hone the best way of doing that. a way in which theyll pay attention. think. and comprehend. my hope is to simply let them know they are not alone. they will be okay. i know that once seemed so inaccurate. it all seemed so hard. i know they will make mistakes i just dont want them to have to endure too costly ones unnecessarily. i dont want them to have to live with the negative consequences forever, hindering them from the positive.

if you really knew me, youd know they dont need all that. they need someone to be there to inform them, to encourage them, to help them become all that they can be by being what they need you to be.