you know, just for once i'd like to blame it on someone else...
i'm pissed at babbitt for not teaching me differentials. he throws out a couple terms the last five minutes of class, and expects the completed assignment the next day. i understand it's AP and he teaches it like college, but i've got news for ya, pal. this isn't college! maybe i SHOULD be capable of teaching myself calculus with nothing but a flashlight and a book under my bedsheets, but i can't. i think it's bullshit that so much time and effort goes into wiping some dumb kids ass, just so maybe he'll learn something about the foundations of algebra, against his will, but seriously. why waste your time, and then leave the semi-intellectual kids like me out to dry. maybe i'm ingrateful, because if it weren't for him teaching calc in the first place, i'd be sitting in mr. andrus's algebra II class getting a 98% for jacking off all hour. but still, if you're gonna half-ass it, why waste your time?

all i can say, is we better have some fucking donuts on friday. something to keep me dredging through the chapter 3 test.

i'm sick of katie being so goddamn difficult. i love her, i really do, but i'm tired of busting my ass, and having shit fall through, then getting flack about how i'm not good enough.

and mom is pretty much the same thing: bust ass -> falls apart -> get flack. it's just fucking rediculous.

i'm supposed to do what they all want me to do, and in the end, all they say they want is for me to be happy, have what's best for me, and stay true to myself! thanks a lot, fuckers.

i know i can't "do it all," but i do as much of 'it all' as i can, and it's never fucking good enough.

so, the next logical thing they tell me, since i can't do it all, i should limit my tasks to things i can accomplish. and (remember, in order to stay true to myself) i will HAVE to accomplish them to standards that I deem reasonable.
i've never really tried it, but i remember (again this is mainly, but not limited to, my mom) all the times i've been told to 'shoot for the stars' and 'never be afraid to try new things'. always being open to new ideas is the equivalent of setting everyone else up for a dissappointment in you.

if i choose not to do new things, and am never open to different ideas, then i'm not living up to my full potential, i'm not striving to be the best that i could possibly be; which is, obviously, unaccebtable. so, then i take on all this extra bullshit, which - ordinarily - would be worthwhile, but then causes me additional stress. so, i'm here working like a dog, driving myself to exhaustion, only to have them say, i should rest. that i'm not taking very good care of myself. i need to relax and take a breather.
so, i sit back. i do the things that i WANT to do, rather than what i SHOULD do, or NEED to be doing... only to have them tell me that i'm a fuck up for laying back on the job when there's shit to be done.

this is approximately my tenth year of living this cycle, of tolerating this incessant bullshit, only to be let down by myself, and be a dissappointment to everyone else.
and in those rare epochs where all those fucks have me convinced for a split second that i'm actually doing okay, it all falls out from under.

and it's not just mom and katie. it includes all those little people that you'd never expect, who blindside me on a daily basis. mom, bruce, dad, katie, libby, teachers, grandparents, friends, family, family friends.

it's rediculous. and i let it happen. because i don't know what else to do.
every day i go to sleep feeling ragged and worthless, or - worse yet - i actually feel good, while there's a nagging part of me that feels guilty for enjoying my mediocrity.

and amid all this, i can't even come up with a good project for tv pro. on "the pressure to attain academic perfection." how's that for ironic?
i suppose it would be moreso if the piece were simply "overall perfection in all aspects of your life."

i suppose, out of all of them, dad is the best to me about it. simply because he has the greatest empathetic capacity. he lives the same shit every day that i do, and does a much better job at dealing with it all. but then again, he's always exhausted. but, more often than not, he seems to enjoy it.

on the one hand he's an inspiration. evidence that someone can actually survive in this sort of lifestyle. but it's also a downer that he squashes my aspirations of ever superceding the cycle of bullshit. i always thought that, one day, i'd be old enough and just grow out of it. that if i just plugged on for a little bit more, maybe god would reward me and make it go away, or something like that.

but that's just delusional.

in the end, i'm just a schmuck who spent his day off talking on the phone with his angry girlfriend, watching a movie, stuffing his face, dicking around, doing laundry, skipping homework, and ranting on his blog.

for most people, that's a normal fucking day. why, for me, then, is it a substandard performance, full of wasting time and not getting shit done?

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