I graduated school in three days. It's a big change, a huge change really. I'm leaving home and going off to college in August. I'll be three hours away from home. For the first time really, I'll be away. On my own, making all my own choices. It's really a great feeling. But it's also really a terrifying one.

But then again, change like this has happened before. Tenth grade I left the school I had been in for over 9 years. I went to a new school, not a tiny private Christian one like the one I had been at, but a much larger public school. I had a single friend when I walked in that door. And today, I have much much more than that single friend.

I met three boys, one that I will freely admit has changed my life forever. He taught me a lot about myself. About staying up late. About coffee and Diet Mountain Dew. He taught me about humanity. About the solace of the midnight hour. About writing. About music. About passion. About love. About lust. About life. He changed my life. I just wish our romance had ended a bit differently, on a better note rather. And I wish I would have treated him better. As our friendship has been quite rocky.

The other boy was a kiss and tell. He taught me a lot too. About friendship and forgiveness. About people and their past. About hidden tendencies. And how no matter what sisters matter more than boys.

Then there's the other boy. The boy that I've been with now for over a year. The one who's teaching me about myself and about well, everything.

Each of these boys has had a huge impact on my life. I wouldn't trade any of them or the experiences that I've had with them for anything. They each have a place in my heart forever. They all have taught me though, that it's the girl friends in your life that mean something irrevocably important. Boys come and go, even though the girls do too.

High school has been an experience. One that has been so interesting. I have overcome so many things. I have learned so much both academically and relating to life. I have also made many mistakes. Some that I am glad I made, because I have learned from them. Others that I wish I hadn't made, because I know they weren't the right thing to do now. But each situation has taught me something and maybe, that makes up for something.

I know these past three years I have changed. I have changed a great deal. But then again, we all have. That's what three years time does. We have all grown into young adults ready to spread our wings and fly. We have all changed our values and our goals a bit at some point in time. But we have all become the people that we are today. That's what three years have done for us. For me, these three years have changed my life. And I'm glad. The people that I have grown close to at any point in time I value a great deal whether we are still friends or not. Because they each had a purpose in my life that they have fulfilled wonderfully and perfectly.

I'm choosing Monday afternoon when I walk out of that Coliseum to leave this experience with no hard feelings. To any of my classmates. I realize that we have all made mistakes, I know I have surely made my fair share. I know that I still have a great deal to learn. I wish each and everyone one of you the absolute best in life. And I offer my apologies to the many things that I have done wrong these few years. I love you guys and I will treasure our memories together. May you find the best in life.


Lauren

Maybe it's just me, or maybe its not. But there came a certain time when I just got sick of all the bullshit. Someone told me to stand up on my own two feet and stop being a doormat. And I did. Maybe I should have done that a very long time ago. I've changed a great deal in the process and my circle of friends has shifted. But I'm happier. I'm soo very much happier than I was during all that time as a doormat.

I know that I have changed. But in the eyes of many people, it has been a change for the better. This change has come through a great deal of self-discovery and self-acknowledgment. In looking at myself, I like this change too. It becomes difficult after a certain point to please people in order to please yourself. It's a tiring ask that never ends and one you can never actually succeed at. After awhile you learn that in the end you have to please three people, yourself, God and your significant other. And the third is highly debatable even still. It's not what you've done for yourself at the end of the day either, its how you feel about what you've done for others. Everyone always says that you feel better about yourself when you do more for others, funny thing is its really true.

When you find yourself coming to terms with all the things that scare you and the things that have destroyed your heart the most. You rediscover yourself. You rediscover the things that make you yourself. Which is one of the reasons why I've ended up back here. In one of the places I have discovered the most about myself, one of the few places where I can say everything while saying nothing.

I do know that sometimes you need answers to questions that others don't want to answer. But those answers sometimes put demons to rest. And those answers are sometimes the best things that you're the most thankful for. I'm realizing that the people who you thought are your very best friends aren't really necessarily your friends. But the people that you don't think you're ever going to be with or be with again, are the one's that surprise you and hold your hand through the good and the bad. I know that friends really do exist for a reason, season or lifetime. And that when they've left their footprints on your heart you can't hold onto the past. You just need to embrace the memory and their purpose and put your feet one in front of the other.


Noela

Karma is a bigger bitch than I will ever need to be. Karma is what will bite you in the ass after you do wrong. Karma will help you out when you do right. Karma makes things right. Karma does what I know I shouldn't.

Karma, what goes around comes around.


me

If you were given the chance to find out exactly what someone really thought of you, would you take it? Even if you knew it would change your opinion of them and yourself forever.

What would happen if you took it? And you enjoyed every moment of the truth. When everything that had been said to you, was a complete lie.

What would happen if you hated every moment of it? And it killed you.

Would you take the chance? Or not?

Thursday makes 5 years that my mother has been dead. And over the years I've come to hate that word, dead. Because above all else it's permanent, it's final, it does not change. The world does not stop spinning, the population does not all pause and acknowledge your lose, you are expected to move on. And it's really hard to do so. I could say that I'm over it, but I'd be lying.
Because I'm not, by any stretch of the word. I am not over my mother's death. I am not over the loss of a loved one. I am not over the void that was created upon her death. I hate cancer. With such passion I'm terrified of it. I'm terrified that it may too eat me alive, just like it killed her.
I want my mother back. For even a moment. I want her. Even though she was messed up, even though my life with her was not the best, she was my mother, she is my mother. That never will change. She is my mother. And I loved her. I still do love her.
Her memory is ingrained in me. I carry her on each day that I am alive, with every beat of my heart, she lives on. I am her daughter. I can not live her life. But I can live mine still and I can make her proud of who her youngest daughter is becoming.
I am Pamela's baby. But I'm a woman. I am her daughter. But I am my own person. And as long as I'm alive, she will live, for a person only dies when they are no longer remembered. I won't run away from her memory, because I know it will only haunt me to my core.
I can make it. And day by day, I do.