Many adults at some point realize their life isn't what they had expected it would be when they were kids. I was blind, in a sense, to what my life would be come. Everyone is, the adventure wouldn't be much fun if we know what we'd be doing or where we'd go from the beginning, the exploration and adventure aren't the spice of life, they are life.
Few people expect their parents to die when they're young. It's not the misconception that people never die, it's more that it's something to worry about in the distant future. My mom was a rock of strength, goal and a guide for my life. I figured I'd live how I wanted, but at the same time doing what she wished of me. I'm not who she thought I'd be, but I don't think she'd completely disapprove of who I am.
My life is interesting, the people I meet are all pretty damn great. I'm quiet, until I've decided I'm comfortable with people, I'm not always who people first think I'm going to be. I dress relatively conservatively, I don't flash a lot of skin, I never wear make-up, I wear a hat and headphones constantly. I could be considered anti-social with how much time I spend with my nose in a book or hunched over my sketchbook or being my laptop, but I'm not. I'm bright, I light up when people I like are around. People seem to put up with me. I'm brash and aggressive, and I have a variety of friends who have seen so many different aspects of who I am it's weird to think about how differently they all perceive me.
I spend time watching and judging before I actually interact with anyone. I'll judge, not in a hateful way (unless they seem like a prick) but so I know how to act around different people. People I met my freshman year of college wouldn't expect me to drink and smoke. Well, they'd accept the drinking, but the type of person I am, I don't seem to be the club type. I'm not, I'm the hang out and have a new experience type. I want to explore and try something new while I can. It's a special person who can put up with me or even wants to exert the energy to try to put up with me. I don't know. My life is not what I would have expected it to be, but in a way it's exactly what I knew it would be.
I think I lost some of the feeling I initially want to go for with this, and that's alright because I'm happy with my life. I hit fucked up depressions and hate everything, but I have different people for different types of conversations who can and will help me.
Jasmine P.
May 2, 2011
I Have Witnessed History
Everyone has witnessed something momentous in their lifetimes, but a part of me feels this is something I should say now.
I'm 22, going on 23, I've been alive during many historic moments, I turned 1 the day the Berlin Wall fell, I was in school or daycare when the OJ Simpson trial happened, I heard Bil Clinton say "I did not have sexual relations with this woman" a million times on the news but I wasn't aware of that. I've been alive when things happened in other countries that were big and I'm still just looking into these events.
I became much more socially aware when a few kids shot of their high school when I was still in elementary school. A few years later religious radicals took down the World Trade Center. I was in seventh grade in the middle of class and kids were being pulled from school by their parents. I don't remember if my day officially ended early, or if I just went home with barely whispered rumors filling in what happened. It's the only thing that was on television that afternoon, it stopped America in it's tracks. People fretted and mourned, there was chaos and confusion. The Pentagon had been hit (between few and several) miles from where I was in school, from where I lived.
At some point there were the DC snipers and Bush sent troops West to find and destroy Al-Qaeda. The troops stayed West and things happened. I apparently wasn't all that aware if I can't tell you what happened for about 6 years, school happened an my mother died things I remember but don't make history. Someone attempts to destroy the British Underground, but doesn't quite succeed. Gay marriage is an important political topic of discussion and wed is decriminalized. I'm older and go off to college and vote for the first time and a black man becomes President of the United States of America, something that has always been possible but somehow not plausible for Americans to accept.
An oil spill fucks over the environment and the oppressed rise up over dictatorships and the nation stops when the celebrities die but that last has always happened. The earth itself rises up to remind humanity that they are not the greatest and that superficial differences ought be forgot and people send aid to New Orleans, Haiti and Japan. Racism is alive and well in America, even as people act like old racist symbols aren't racist, but they totally are. I'm focused on my non historic finals and classes when Osama Bin Laden is taken out.
In ten years, a few months shy of the 10th Anniversary of the WTC going down the man we were told was pretty much Enemy Number One has been killed. The nation revels in the death of one, someone who has been Othered to the point of being a concept and less a person. I can say I heard the information, then went to sleep. I think this is something that people need a moment to absorb, things are going to be interesting for a minute. I don't know. I just wrote this. Maybe I'll continue to write about historic moments when they happen, but you really don't know if something will be big until it's been years, but I think that waiting hours is fair for something like this.
Jasmine P.
I'm 22, going on 23, I've been alive during many historic moments, I turned 1 the day the Berlin Wall fell, I was in school or daycare when the OJ Simpson trial happened, I heard Bil Clinton say "I did not have sexual relations with this woman" a million times on the news but I wasn't aware of that. I've been alive when things happened in other countries that were big and I'm still just looking into these events.
I became much more socially aware when a few kids shot of their high school when I was still in elementary school. A few years later religious radicals took down the World Trade Center. I was in seventh grade in the middle of class and kids were being pulled from school by their parents. I don't remember if my day officially ended early, or if I just went home with barely whispered rumors filling in what happened. It's the only thing that was on television that afternoon, it stopped America in it's tracks. People fretted and mourned, there was chaos and confusion. The Pentagon had been hit (between few and several) miles from where I was in school, from where I lived.
At some point there were the DC snipers and Bush sent troops West to find and destroy Al-Qaeda. The troops stayed West and things happened. I apparently wasn't all that aware if I can't tell you what happened for about 6 years, school happened an my mother died things I remember but don't make history. Someone attempts to destroy the British Underground, but doesn't quite succeed. Gay marriage is an important political topic of discussion and wed is decriminalized. I'm older and go off to college and vote for the first time and a black man becomes President of the United States of America, something that has always been possible but somehow not plausible for Americans to accept.
An oil spill fucks over the environment and the oppressed rise up over dictatorships and the nation stops when the celebrities die but that last has always happened. The earth itself rises up to remind humanity that they are not the greatest and that superficial differences ought be forgot and people send aid to New Orleans, Haiti and Japan. Racism is alive and well in America, even as people act like old racist symbols aren't racist, but they totally are. I'm focused on my non historic finals and classes when Osama Bin Laden is taken out.
In ten years, a few months shy of the 10th Anniversary of the WTC going down the man we were told was pretty much Enemy Number One has been killed. The nation revels in the death of one, someone who has been Othered to the point of being a concept and less a person. I can say I heard the information, then went to sleep. I think this is something that people need a moment to absorb, things are going to be interesting for a minute. I don't know. I just wrote this. Maybe I'll continue to write about historic moments when they happen, but you really don't know if something will be big until it's been years, but I think that waiting hours is fair for something like this.
Jasmine P.
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