it's almost been 3 years since my dad passed away, yet it doesn't feel like he's been gone at all. i feel like when i go home from school i'm gonna see him. i get really excited at the prospect, but when i really think about it, he's not gonna be home. he's not gonna be sitting on the couch in my living room, nor reading the paper, and i can't hear his voice, or talk to him about my problems. it just hurts so much. i can't take it. my heart hurts

i get so caught up in my own bullshit that i lose sight of what's important to me. not a day goes by without me thinking of my dad, but when i sit down and actually think about him, all i can do is cry and cry. i miss him so much. i feel like a part of me is missing. i guess that's why the fall semester is always so tough for me, because he's all i can think about. i know that school is where i need to be at for the next two years, but sometimes it's so hard to grasp

had a really awful, and now i get to finally relax and i realize that i have a full week of classes ahead of me....it's gonna be the longest week ever! i can't believe i'm a junior already. it feels great to finally be an upperclassman, but i just really want to be done with school and live my life, without having to worry about my classes or finding someone to eat a meal with. i barely have time to focus on my own personal things. all i can think about is school and how time consuming it is. i just want to be done with school and live in my own place and be able to work a steady job, instead of this bullshit

I had a really shitty night tonight upon realizing how unfulfilling my summer has been up to this point. Everything they do seems to rattle me in some way or another. I thought I would be farther along at this point in my life, but I feel my happiness is still out of grasp. My hometown has a way of giving the youth everything, and leaving them empty. Growing up, my parents gave me everything I could have ever wanted. Now that I'm an adult, I feel that life in my hometown was a blessing and yet a curse. And now that my best friend and father have passed away, I feel like I am missing a substantial part of myself. In an attempt to feel better, I tried to think about the love my father, dog ad girlfriend have for me. It all hit me at once, and I couldn't help but think about the good times I've had with all three individuals. I pictured my dog jumping up and down whole barking, my dad smiling at me while in Philadelphia, and spending time cooking with Emily.  While i was thinking about these memories, the song "Dancepack" by Volcano Choir was playing in my head. I heard the lyrics "theres still a hole in your heart" in my head.I couldn't help but cry knowing that while most of my friends are idiots, I am loved

Thanks to my friend Mike for giving me good advice tonight

Hope never dies

My struggle with depression is an everyday occurance. A lot of the time i can hardly motivate myself to do anything. But as I lay here, I know that I must keep plugging away. I have to overcome this, to prove everyone wrong. Sometimes, though, I'm overcome with a sense of emptiness. Panic grips my chest, and tunnel vision sets in. The world around me blurs. I have a great disdain for my friends. They are so immature sometimes that they are jaded and have no concept of the real world, that life is bigger than our former high school lives and the world is larger than our little suburb where we grew up. They just need to grow up, and express how they really feel.

I saw an inspiring graffiti while I was in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It was "hope never dies"

Today at 4:30 p.m., my dog Nikita passed away. He's been my dog, shit, my best friend, since i was four years old. He was and is such a beautiful animal. I didn't even consider him a dog. He was a part of my family. Every since memory I have, he was associated with it in one way or another. He would always be waiting for me at  sitting on the couch near the front window, waiting for me to come home. He was the most gentle creature i've ever known. He would never hurt anyone. His death hurts as equally as much as me losing my father. We had such a special bond. He changed my life, and now it feels as though a part of me is dead. I can't feel anything right now except for pain. Sitting here at my desk, I remember him always walking right between my legs, and standing or sitting in the area underneath my desk. I've just had so much history with him, so many great memories. He was there for me through thick and thin.

 How much more loss can I endure before I break? I feel so weak, defenseless, vulnerable.

Rest in peace, Nikita. I know you'll keep my dad company in heaven. Just know that i love you so much

i think i realized what's bothering me. i think i'm unhappy. maybe it's because i'm remorseful of opportunities lost, of my childhood that was so ephemeral, it has slipped through my fingers.

or perhaps i'm so stressed by this amount of work i have to do, that i simply bury my head in my schoolwork all day, so i can't focus on anything else

She knows a good thing now
With our own cost and all can hear the word
In my head and in my thoughts
In my head and in my thoughts

We spend the whole days all
We're feeling more apart
And we know you can do more

Please, don't let me hurt you more
It's in your stare and at your core
Please, don't let me hurt you more
Please, don't let me hurt you more

I know this journey's soon
The color of lights and our lives become as you

Please, don't let me hurt you more
It's in your stare and at your core
Please, don't let me hurt you more
Please, don't let me hurt you more

(James Blake - Dlm)

I haven't felt the way
I feel today
In so long its hard
For me to specify
I'm beginning to notice
How much this feels like
A waking limb
Pins and needles
Nice to know you
Goodbye
Nice to know you
To know, you

The day after I had counted down

All of your breaths
Down until there were none
A hummingbird crashed right
in front of me and I understood
all you did for us.
You gave, and gave, and gave, and gave.

Ohhh, every night I ask myself
Am I giving enough?
Am I?

while i was in the library today, i had the weirdest sense of deja vu. i had some flashbacks from high school, and how it eerily coincided with some events i noticed today.

for instance, every time i go to my child rights class, i feel like i'm being transported to my intro to sociology i took as a senior in high school, where there were only 3 guys and we barely spoke up. in my current class, there are 6 guys and 30 girls.

and how recently i've been obsessed with the book "the catcher in the rye" which was my favorite book when i first read it sophomore year in high school

and much like sophomore year in high school, i can't seem to have the pieces click and i ended up hanging out with only one or two friends, much like my current situation

it sucks how things come full circle and i realize that i'm not nearly at the place i want to be physically emotionally and mentally

i wish i were able to work out more and that i think i had a better physique in high school

i guess god is testing me or something. maybe i need to learn from my mistakes or something, but i'm sick of feeling sorry for myself and this crippling depression i succumb to. 

so here i sit here, by myself, like usual, and i find myself absolutely and unequivocally alone emotionally. i feel like i can't connect with my new friends on a deeper level and it makes me feel anxious. it's like pulling teeth to have a conversation with some of my friends here. everyone around me is too busy doing their own thing to notice that i'm floundering

even her friends can't be bothered to talk to me. they whisper about their personal lives in front of me, as if i were not even supposed to be there to hear them talking. i feel like they will never consider me their friend. my only title is "her boyfriend"and that's all i will be to them

i was washing my hands in the bathroom earlier, and the poem, "Harlem" by Langston Hughes was stuck in my head for some reason. it goes like this:

What happens to a dream deferred?

      Does it dry up

      like a raisin in the sun?

      Or fester like a sore—

      And then run?

      Does it stink like rotten meat?

      Or crust and sugar over—

      like a syrupy sweet?

      Maybe it just sags

      like a heavy load.

      Or does it explode?

 

i feel like i'm going to explode right now. 

my dad would always tell me a famous quote my Horace Greeley. It went like this: "Go West young man"

that quote has been stuck in my head ever since. i miss my dad so much

i came to the sudden realization today that i am completely and utterly on my own

i feel like i have to figure things out on my own, because at the end of the day, not many people have my back

most of the time, it seems that everyone has some sort of bullshit ulterior motive or some factor that is driving them to do the things they do, and some of the time, what people say to me is self-satisfying to that individual, and kind of leaves me hanging

i should be used to this by now, but like everytime, this still amazes me

that people have the capacity to let me down. perpetually

choking, drowning, anxious about the future. i'm tired of all this bullshit, and i can't live in the moment.

i'm tired of sitting around, and wasting my time.

for whatever reason, when i panic i think of what my life would be like if i decided to go out to colorado, my dream for a good year and a half now

i'd like to go there this summer to experience life that doesn't revolve living in the northeast

a sort of a roadtrip for a couple weeks

i've always wanted to enjoy nature in the midwest. just to go for a hike in the forest. it's gorgeous out there

to bring my dad with me. if not physically, at least spiritually

to experience another lifestyle with him, together

to be in a better place mentally, that i so desperately dream of

instead of being trapped in my room, that awful box that always reminds me of how devastating senior year was, when i only wanted to end my life

today it snowed on campus (since i go to a school by the shore, it was only an accumulation of an inch) and i had to walk across campus. as i was walking, i was listening to the song woods by bon iver

every time i listen to that song, it makes me feel down, but this time it was a life changing occurrence. it was so peaceful, even though the weather was so chaotic. kids were rushing to class, but i didn't have a care in the world. all that mattered was the snow, the soft melodic voice of Justin Vernon and the steady rhythm of my feet crunching the snow beneath my feet.

the lyrics echoed in my ears over and over

"I'm up in the woods
I'm down on my mind
I'm building a still
To slow down the time"

i miss my dad so much

why can't he physically be here with me? sitting next to me in class, or in the library or at the dinner table with my new "friends"?

i don't have everything together

everything is a ruse

i want to see my dad when he was healthy and vibrant so badly. i'm so envious of everyone who has a dad who is breathing, seeing, feeling, touching, smiling

what would my dad say about me right now? would he be proud of me? disappointed? i want to hear his voice so much

why am i so consumed by this? why can't i just be stronger, instead of being shaken up by everything?

and while i sit here, i realize that it's bee three years to the day that my father got sick

three,fucking.years

where the fuck did the time go?

why am i still so damaged? i can't seem to help myself. like at all

i guess i expected all this change to happen at once at this new school

i struggled, worked tirelessly, and lost sleep over getting good grades. good grades that allowed me to get into this school

but while i like the academic aspect of school, the schedules and organization of doing assignments on time, i can't seem to grasp the social aspect

i'm so different than everyone at both schools i've been to

i'm not some unmotivated kid at central who couldn't get into his first pick school, who struggles academically

and yet i'm not some boarding/prep school upper middle-class pretentious asshole

i struggle to find things to talk about with these kids. i'm so consumed with schoolwork, i can't seem to hold a normal conversation

it's just so hard sometimes

i know i need to give it time, but a part of me thinks i should be doing more, and more, and more

so tonight, a couple of girls that i was hanging out with called me a "straight gay best friend"

what the FUCK is that?

i resent that shit so much. they said that i'm not really a "guy's guy" they said i was a gentleman, but couldn't they have just stopped after that?

great. guess i give off that kind of vibe

where along the line have i changed that much? so what that i prefer the company of girls? it's harder for me to make connections with guys.

and i guess that makes me effeminate? it makes me so furious that people see me as that

i've never struggled so hard to fit in. i'm so outgoing, and nobody seems to appreciate it

i shouldn't have to feel bad about this, and i shouldn't be internalizing this so much

but i always care about what people think of me

i'm polite, and respectful, but apparently, no one wants that in a guy, because it makes me seem weak

i like who i am

When I'm at the pearly gates
This'll be on my videotape

When Mephistopheles is just beneath
And he's reaching up to grab me

This is my way of saying goodbye
Because I can't do it face to face
So I'm talking to you before it's too late

No matter what happens now
I shouldn't be afraid
Because I know today has been the most perfect day I've ever seen. 

i'm just a kid

who really fucking misses his dad

as time passes, i have fewer and fewer things to remind myself of him

i just spent the last hour panicking as i tried to find a birthday card he gave to me when he was sick

i couldn't breathe, and all i could manage to do was sob uncontrollably as i tore my room apart, finding other things that reminded me of him, which made me even more distraught

i still can't find that god damn card

does anyone really care about my struggle anymore? as time goes by, my pleas for some help seem to fall on more and more deaf ears