I've been telling myself the past two months that the first semester of my college life is going to be without a doubt the most important. I can see myself now; alienating myself from friends I swore I wouldn't lose touch with, not converse with people who live on campus like I said I would, and cause one too many problems with the love of my life. I hear the Horror stories from people who have friends or who've been matched with roomates from New Century College; they write five to ten page papers after every class, they're locked in their rooms and become invisible because of the harsh coarsework in reading and writing. I keep telling myeslf to tackle things as soon as I get them. So I may miss Dr. Phil and Oprah everyday, that's fine, college is more important.
But then I start to think to myself. It's that cliche moment when I sit and question everything I'm about to embark on and set forward into with my life. Do I really want to teach? I can't stand Caitlin half the time I'm around her, now put 25-100 (how do they expect class sizes for Elementary school to be by time I teach) in one room with me to regulate them. My favorite form of "hey let's pay attention" is by screaming "Shut the fuck up!" Somehow, I don't think this is going to get me through difficult moments with children. Then I think about acting and how much I love(d) it and how much it meant to me. And how heartwrenching it was at Greenroom, knowing I cared about only a handfull of people in the room, and the one person I cared about the most wouldn't be spending the majority of his days we me the following year. I took advantage of my time in high school; just as everyone warned me not to. Now I feel like a schmuck.
I don't know where all of this urge to write is coming from. Three days worth, possibly?
Y'see, on Zack's birthday (yesterday) we went to Super Pets. This pet store in Annandale. Of course we went there; it was his birthday. So on the way there all the sudden I start thinking about my Dad. I don't really know where it came from, it just kind of popped into my head. Then that six letter word that haunts me starts flashing in my head. REGRET. It's terrifying to me. Should I have called him when he asked me to go out to dinner and I didn't call him back? REGRET. Should I have said more to him at my graduation? REGRET. Should I let all of this go and understand that I need a relationship with my father? REGRET.
It's taken me a while, but I've realized why I was so mad at my Dad in the first place. My father is an asshole and a bum. He's an alcoholic, and a terrible father. He was in jail for the entire summer when Steven was first born, and hasn't had his liscense since I was two. He's smoked pot in front of me since I was in seventh grade, and allowed me to get drunk at his home. He's everything I fear being as a parent. I place my Mom, on the other hand, on a pedestal that cannot be faultered in any way, shape, or form. Because of the bullshit she has triumphed over, being a single parent, broke, breast cancer survivor, suffering a miscarriage before Caitlin; my Mom is my hero. So when Dad emailed Mom critisizing everything she'd become and strived for; ignoring his many and enormous faults, I was outraged. How dare he! I'll never forgive him. I already know that, and I think he does too.
Apparently Zack and my Mom were talking one time, I think it was at my graduation, when my Mom said something to Zack about my Dad. Making a comment like, "I don't think Shannon will ever admit how hurt she really was that her Dad moved." She's right; part of me never will, not to myself at least. Yes I was hurt, and angry, and confused, and overjoyed; I was just so caught off guard I didn't know what to think. My anger for my father is seventeen and ten months worth. I hate him because he was hardly there, because he was a terrible influence, because he passed on his worst of traits to me. I need to stop crying, hold on...
So my therapst, Mrs. Stratton, wants me to look at the difference between should and could. I should understand that I'm not the only freshman going into GMU with no idea what they're doing. I could... She says that should for her is a flag word, and that I should (hah) start paying attention to it, recognizing it. Maybe Zack's right, maybe she is full of shit. She's just leading me to think, that's all...and hey, with my insurance it only costs us $20 a visit.
It angers me, actually, how against therapy Zack is sometimes. (And religion for that matter. Well, not all religion, just mine. And the fact that his brother believes in it.) While I go on Prozac and make serious strides to perfect our relationship and myself as an individual, he mocks it and calls it a sham. I just don't understand when he can see and knows there's a difference in me, how he can't stretch and think that something possibly good can come out of it all, y'know?
I miss Steven.
I need to go to bed, I've got to get up early and call into work. Maybe the lie I'll tell will come to me in a dream...? I'm going to the beach Monday morning, I probably won't get the chance to update again. So until then...
Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, you're cool, fuck you.
I'm out.
