Then there's this growing up thing. When I was up at camp, I had a mind spasm, and I couldn't stop thinking about it. I talked to Gianni about it, and just looking at Jen shows me that I'm not alone in my worries. I mean, there are all these 'lasts.' This is the last election I can't vote in. This is the last year that I'll be tried as a minor in court. This is my last year as minor PERIOD. This is my last year in high school. My last year at Catalina. The last year Dad is leagally obligated to support me. Maybe the last year I call home "home." I'm almost grown up. All my life it's been 'when I grow up' and now it's right around the corner, I don't want it. I'm watching the last of my childhood stream through my hands and now I've got adulthood looming like a huge, unconquerable, black mountain, which, to tell you the truth, I really would rather sit at the bottom of. But, oh no, that is NOT an option, and any day now I'm going to start being pushed, kicking and screaming, up the face of that damn mountain. And this will continue untill I'm 50 and they say I'm "over the hill" which is, in fact, a huge understatement, 'cause I'm standing at the bottom of this baby, and it ain't no hill, I'll tell you that much. This thing is MAMOTH. Definitely not the kind of thing you would want to meet up with in a dark ally somewhere. Too late to go back, though. Not like it was ever early enough to, though, because if there was a way, trust me, I would have found it. Am I fucked in the head here, or what? Here I am, having major anxiety over something I can niether stop nor slow down. It seems like in situations like these, it would be a lot easier if you just rolled with it, because stress isn't going to help the situation. And sticking your head in the ground doesn't help either. I did that as a kid and you know what I discovered? The world doesn't stop for you. It'll plow right over you like a frieght train. Lovely thought, isn't it? Fine, call me a pessimist. You know what pessimists are? They are those annoying people who see straight through the candy coating and glare at reality. You can call it whatever you want, but escargot is still snails, and even if it looks like a truffle, chocolate covered grasshoppers are bugs with candy coating. "The chocolate makes it go down easier." Jesus. And in the meantime, as I dwell happily in my protected enviornment, babies are dieing, people are being raped, torchured, killed, starved, wars are being fought over what/how a group of people call God, the national debt is growing, the rich are getting richer as the poor get poorer, children are being abused, sold in to prostitution, hunted down and murdered in cold blood. What the hell? Why can't we do anything? Criminals roam freely because our court system is so fucked up. But then in other countries, places like Japan, Singapore, people are held in jails without even being charged of a crime. Entertainment people are paid huge sums of money while the people who are creating our future, the teachers who are shaping our youth, get nothing. But there is no outcry from the public. Why? What has made us so dessensitized? How is it that we just stand by and let shit happen. Fuck the bumper sticker. But I'm tired of this. I'm going to bed now.