I am fourteen years old. My bathroom sink is lined with deodorant and acne cream, the mirror covered in Post-it notes and stickers. I’ve cried upon getting F’s, and I hate people who don’t deserve it. I pretend to be something I’m not, afraid that who I really am would scare prospective friends away. I tell myself who cares what they think? But on nights when I can’t sleep, I despair at the thought that there is no one who understands me. I lie to myself often, and later regret it. I bite my nails, and daydream constantly. Sometimes I wake up with my self-esteem dragging on the floor, my pride in pieces, and just looking at my reflection in the mirror makes me cringe. I keep a diary, but even in those pages I cannot be completely truthful. I think about love, and limerence but I can’t bring myself to believe in them. I melt into walls, hoping no one will notice me.
So entirely typical.
Already, I want to grow up. I want to cram for college midterms and work a part-time job to pay rent. I want to save up and buy a SmartCar (perferably taxicab yellow) and a one-bedroom apartment in Manhattan with peeling paint, green apliances and letters from the 80’s stuck in the walls. I want to share it with a finicky, sushi-eating Korean guitarist and a black, sanguine cat. I want to be an intern in an investment bank, and adopt children with wide-open arms and faraway eyes.
They tell me these are the best years of life. Adolescence? Someday I might believe such a prospect, but today it seems downright ridiculous. I am too young to be taken seriously, but too old to live carelessly. Teetering in a phase that makes no sense at all.
Being part of such a limbo annoys me to no end. I like things to stay constant, right where they are. But now everything I know is swerving, changing, morphing from one day to the next. Flipping upside down, right side up. And why?
Too many variables for a definitive answer. So all I can do is wait.
hells to the yes, emma!
I can’t wait to be an adult. not to drink or have sex or smoke. (i can do all of those things now and not get caught anyway LOL) but because i think life will be better because im actually living in the world. not the little bubble we call CSG or school in general i want an apartment in the city. I want cats and an aquarium full of colorful fish. I want a job that I like or at least dont hate. i want to learn. not just memorize and regurgitate like I do now but actually LEARN things that will stay with me forever. i want children and im not waiting for a husband to get them. actually im not even waiting for a man to have kids. i think i’ll swing by the sperm bank on my way home from work…XD my mother complains about adulthood all the time. by the end of the day im like “gimme the damn car keys I’ll go get the milk. you just sit here and plot the ships route from varna to whitby. then convert to nautical miles. then add the hours and divide by miles to get the average speed. oh and dont forget to color the map”
A fourteen-year-old
making
this
I don’t
WHAT
(You’re actually like that girl in the “Orphan” movie, right? Did you see “Orphan”? In “Orphan” the little girl who everyone thinks is like eight does a bunch of psycho stuff and then at the end of “Orphan” BAMMMM. IMPECCABLY. WELL-DISGUISED. FORTY-YEAR-OLD. MANNNNNNN.
… yeah, don’t see “Orphan” unless you like unintentional comedies.)
Em edit: I used to say that my dream was to be mistaken for a forty-year-old housewife trying to troll the internets by impersonating a teenager.
KYLIE, YOU HAVE FULFILLED THIS DREAM. THANK YOU.
NOW, TIME TO FIND NEW DREAM.