So, back to school we go, and, of course, things suck. I'm used to being surrounded by friends who enjoy the coming of school, because it usually means it's easier to see your friends. This year, I have finally sadly prevailed and managed to prove them wrong. All forms of friendships which have kept me sane and willing to wake up with the sun every morning , and to actually go to school are now gone, with a few small exceptions, these being two people. One of which I have one class with, the other one, my girlfriend, I used to see in the halls between each class last year, but now... nothing. She says it'll change, it being just the first day and all... but I can't help but disbelieve her.
The worst thing to have happened to me this year is that Mike's gone. Always a cherished and valued friend, since the second half of my first year of high school, there hasn't been a day of school that's gone by without us seeing each other in one way or another. And last year, when we even had the pleasure of sharing a class and being able to get to know each other better and becoming the great friends we are now, things were great. This year, I find myself hallucinating in the hallways, missing the big looming figure that usually walked by my side, I find myself searching the crowds, in hope of finding the ever obvious person that is, was, and always will be Mike. I find this a pathetic trait in me, seeing as I should be used to leaving people and people leaving me, having moved around so much during my childhood, but this prevails as a different median. Mike, for all intensive purposed, is someone I've grown up with. Mike has known me through the most difficult times of my teenage life, and there was never a time when he wasn't there with his wealth of knowledge and information. Him and I being so much alike, we always found that in our conversations, we'd always says such things as, "Yeah, I'm just like that," or "I know how you feel," but not in the normal american small talk way that most people do, instead in a serious and understanding way in which the both of us knew that the other was not in fact just bullshiting along to keep the other occupied.
Now... the reason I'm so attached to Mike, is that he's one of the first friends I actually made on my own, and not a hand me down from my older brother. For a very long time, all my friends were those of my brother, or siblings thereof. Any friends I would have made on my own, were never really close to me, and were never really friends. These were people around whom I had to put up a façade around, due to the fact that I was always scared that I might say or do something that would strike them wrongly in some way, and would cause us to lose the friendship we had. In short, I was a pathetic follower who didn't really have any friends. The other people I called friends were my brother's friends who didn't mind me too much, seeing as I usually kept quiet around those people.
This all changed with 2 people. Mike and evan. evan I had known since 6th grade, and he hated me till around mid-8th grade, at which point we stopped hating each other, but we still were not friends. After that, we got closer, and by the end of 9th grade, and the beginning of 10th grade, we were practically inseparable. But that inseparability would not have happened without Mike, whom I had met halfway through 9th grade. Mike was, and still is, a particularly different person. Never has he been like the rest of the world, and he knew it, and let everyone else know it. This completely amazed me. Never before had I met such a façade less person, and so I was instantly intrigued by him. At first, when he spoke to me, I didn't think we would get too close, and in fact, I thought he was just some nice geek, which in fact is true, but I used to think that was a bad thing. Today, my train of thought is different, especially seeing as I see myself as being a nice geek, and I'm damned fucking proud! So seeing Mike, and how true to himself he was, was something that completely changed my train of thought. I said to myself, this is how I need to start acting. No more of this saying what you want to hear bullshit, no more not saying something because it might make you lose your friends. If someone is gonna judge me when I act like yourself, then that person doesn't deserve to be my friend, they're not good enough.
Between 9th and 10th grade, I went to visit some friends in Israel. At this point, the whole being myself philosophy hadn't really fully registered in my head as clearly as I make it sound today, and me being in a country that has a different language, that I had at that time mostly forgotten, didn't help either. It's hard to express individualistic thoughts when you're restricted in such ways. When I got back from Israel, everything changed. I realized how close I was to evan. After coming back, I spent a lot of time with evan during that summer, and, when it started, it came to a point where we were mostly hanging out during school. But I had never really told myself and known for myself that he was truly my friend, and I still held the feeling that if I said something wrong, he'd stop being so nice. This all changed when Chrissy's mom asked us how long we'd been best friends for. At this moment, the both of us stared at each other and we both realized at that moment that we were in fact best friends. Something that he hadn't noticed because he never put to much thought to it, and something I had never said because I was afraid I'd lose him if I did. That night, me and him had a long conversation about what I just wrote about, and that's when I really began changing and becoming the asshole I am today :). And I'm damned fucking proud! So from then on, I had the appeal of just being myself around people, and letting them judge me by by that, and if they don't like me.. eh.
