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this page is about me.

me.

clearly it's about me.

i have nothing to say about myself.

i went to a christian school for 2/3rds of my life. i hated it. at the time, i thought it was tolerable.. but looking back, it clearly wasn't the place for me. i like music that i like. kokomo christian school does not like the music that i like. my sixth grade teacher made a note of that as he singled me out from the whole class for having a nirvana unplugged tape in my backpack. it was my goddamned tape in my backpack.. i was getting it out to give to a friend. it was after school as we waited for our parents to pick us up.

track number three off the album is "Jesus doesn't want me for a Sunbeam".. this did not go over well. they could not punish me.. for there was no rule against having tapes (or else they would have to punish the god-fearing children and their dc talk tapes too). however, he could mock me and "that music [i] listen to.."

the very next day we had an in-class exercise about who was going to heaven.. the class clapped if the person was going to heaven, stayed silent if he was not. "is jesus going to heaven?" he asked.. the class clapped. "what about mother theresa? is she going to heaven?" the class clapped. "kurt cobain? does he belong in heaven?" he glanced over at me. the class did not clap. except. for me and my friend. my boisterous friend pointed out that if kurt cobain accepted god, he could go into heaven. this is, after all, what we are learning in school, is it not? he continued. quietly i muttered (i was too afraid to address the whole class) "regardless of anyone's sins, they can still reach heaven." i also wanted to tell my teacher that the song wasn't even an actual nirvana song.. it was a cover of the vaselines (or at least the way the vaselines did it)... therefore, nirvana playing that song did not condemn them to hell any more than it did my teacher for pronouncing the title. but i did not.

i learned something that day. kurt cobain cannot go to heaven.

i hated kokomo christian school.

did you know that an untucked shirt and a pair of jeans promotes an unruly classroom? it does. only khakis (the pockets cannot be sewn on, for they are the devil's playground) and tucked-in collared shirt can be worn in the presence of our father, who art in heaven.

chewing gum was also highly diabolic. in fifth grade, again after school, i was caught chewing gum.. juicy fruit, to be exact. well, underneath all that sweet juicy flavor lies evil incarnate, for i had to write five hundred sentences explaining that "i will not chew gum in school, because it is a school rule."

i did not enjoy my time.

socially, it was an absolute disaster. if you ever developed an underlining hatred for a classmate.. you'd best work it out, because you were bound to see him or her every year until you graduated.. (kcs goes all the way up to the senior year.. luckily i got out of there after 7th..). in seventh grade, there were approximately 17 children in my class. six were boys. meaning that i had six friends to choose from. (though i can't recall it ever happening, i believe that if the faculty found out that students were actually dating each other, they would call a parent-teacher conference on the spot.. to make sure everyone is aware of the "implications" that the "romantic individuals" are throwing around.)

by seventh grade, i only had two real friends. jesse and aaron.

and neither lived anywhere near me (kcs did not have district lines, so practically all the enrolled students came from outside the city.. which meant that we could not get picked up by the bus.. our parents took us to school.. for me, this meant i was chronically late to school, and had to wait for her an additional 1-3 hour(s) after school.. every day. for nine years.)

pre-school to seventh grade.. a barrel-load of fun for all.

zack bolinger lives down the street from me. he and i were friends at the time, but it was clear things were changing. he went to a public school for his elementary life, so i could not relate with him all too well. we still had fun together, but by this point in my life i figured that no one saw what i saw and no one felt the way i felt.. so i had to bottle up my disparaging thoughts, in order to maintain the unenlightening life of the status quo.

in seventh grade a poem we were reading out loud contained the word breast in it. we were not aloud to say breast at kokomo christian school.. so chest was easily substituted. in 8th grade, we read the play 1776, and i reveled in the fact that, not only was i allowed to say bitch and damn, but i could do it in front of the class with the teacher's blessing.

mrs. genovese (my 8th and 9th grade key english teacher) made school worth going to by allowing me all the creative freedom i needed. i went ballistic. she called me a delightful writer.. this was the first time i had ever been complimented for writing at school. i had relatively no experience at writing actual compositions before 8th grade. i had little idea of what a five-paragraph or 500-word essay entailed. writing at kcs consisted of fill-in-the blanks and answering questions about why god loves us. in fifth grade, we had a 30 minute creative writing session once a week.. however, what we turned was graded on a completion scale, and not individually looked at. to me, a completion grade means that any special effort i put into a project is not appreciated.. therefore reducing me to a minimalist state of mind.

but in eighth grade.. in eighth grade i could doodle, and it wouldn't be detrimental towards my grade.. no, it would be commented on, and, if accurate with the work we had, it would be praised. so, as the amount of creative writing in my english classes dwindled (and it dwindled into nothingness).. the doodles became my river of creativity, and a source of undeniable fun.

however..

in my senior year english class (and other classes in the same year..) my doodles took a turn.. often, they were sad creatures that screamed "i'm important," or "i'm necessary.." their eyes drooped and their mouths frowned. everything about them reeked of depression, to me, at least. however, these were not an emotional cry for help. this was not me stating i was important. it was the doodles themselves, telling me, that they were important. this was my creative plea for attention. and it scared the hell out of me.

second semester of ap english for that senior year was an absolute beast to bear. everyday was a ritualistic custom that mimicked the day before. it was absolute order with minimal randomness. this, to me, was pure chaos. every once in a while, we got in groups and did study guides... my depressing doodles took center stage as onlookers viewed them and said "oh.. that's interesting.".. and then left. which cued to substitute teacher to come over and say "looks like we have an artist in our midst.".. the man was an asshole, to save myself a paragraph.

these doodles are poorly drawn stick figures and basic shapes. i don't believe they're well-drawn in any way.. but they've given themselves personality, so that makes them special to me. all they wanted was a little attention, and a little freedom. which, i could not give them at the time.

however..

i had some free time earlier (i had a lot of free time earlier, actually).. so i wrote some stuff and drew a couple of things.. and the first one i made said, with an indifferent smile, "i'll try the best i can." now, other than this being a slightly incorrect radiohead lyric.. it should be the truth.

i feel like such a teenager for being all angst-y about this. better late than never i suppose.

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