Yesterday was possibly the best day I have had in months. A full day at Darien Lake with two of my best friends, with no lines, no waits, and tons of fun. I had a blast with Matt and Brad, and I went home thoroughly tired. But before I went home, before the laserlight show, I decided to go on the bumper cars ride with Matt. We walked over to the line, and it was only the two of us in line, but due to the rules Darien Lake has in place, the operator was forced to make everyone get off, and I did feel kind of bad for the people on the ride. I mean, it was just two of us, and there were plenty of cars open. But the operator had to follow the rules.

Anyway, when the operator made everyone get off, several drunk guys started swearing at him. They had been riding in the wrong direction, and this had led to a major traffic jam in the middle of the ring, with cars facing the wrong way trapped together. But instead of realizing that it was their fault, the guys started to swear at the guy because he wouldn’t let them move them by hand (it was against the rules of his job). They acted like complete assholes to him, and it was just ridiculous.

As I sat there in my car and tried to ignore the drunks abuse the operator, I couldn’t help but think about how they were ruining what a great day I’d had. Matt and I just looked at each other, and I could tell that they had put him in a bad mood as much as they had me. It was depressing to watch guys with BAC’s over .1 abuse a guy who was just trying to keep a job to support himself and whatever he had, and just destroyed my faith in humanity. I couldn’t help but feel depressed as I walked off the ride, because it was obvious that even when they were sober, these guys didn’t have an ounce of respect for people other than themselves.

But then, as Matt and I walked away, we started talking about what we had seen, and I as I talked, I couldn’t help but think about how I was letting human beings (if you could call them that) destroy the awesome day I had had. It made me sick to think that I could be so easily beaten down.

Then, after riding the Superman a final time, I walked over to the laserlight show, where, as I watched the dancing lights and felt the booming rhythm shake my body, I realized that my life was just too short to let that kind of thing happen to me. For Pete’s sake, I’m going to be a senior in less than a week, and I don’t have much time left with these people at all. I started to ask myself, “Do I really want to waste a single minute with them feeling sad or depressed?”.

I realized quickly that the answer was definitely no, and then and there, I made a vow. No matter how hard things got, no matter how down on my luck I was feeling, I could not let myself get so depressed that I wasn’t having any fun living. I swore to myself that I would make the most out of every second by taking chances and laughing and just plain LIVING. I promised myself that I would live for today, love yesterday, and hope for tomorrow as I danced through the night before.

As I walked away from the show, stumbling and laughing from exhaustion and just plain fun, I felt a little of that feeling that I had realized I so desperately wanted. I wasn’t worrying about what tomorrow would bring, I was relishing in the mystery and suspense of my future. I wasn’t dwelling on my regrets of yesterday, I was reliving the joys of my past. I wasn’t wasting time thinking about the past or the future, I was using every moment I had as a springboard to fly higher the next. I realized in that moment, that I have been blessed with the greatest gifts that any human can receive, and I have been blessed with the choice to use or to waste them.

So right here and now, I’m going to promise myself something. I swear, by my very being, that I will live for today, love yesterday, and hope for tomorrow, all while I dance through each day of my life like it were my last.

so what is with my obsession with everything that is wrong with me?

i’d call it perfectionism, but it goes beyond that. it’s not just freaking out when i get a question wrong a test, in fact, i’m cool with stuff like that. what worries me is how obsessed i am with losing or not being good enough. like in tennis. i’m actually a fairly decent player on a good day, but for some reason, every time i hit a bad shot it makes me certain that i suck. i could play a perfect game except for one shot that went long, and i would still be freaking about that one shot a week later when i thought about that game.

another place where i do this is when it comes to getting into college. as i sat at the admissions presentation at nazareth last saturday, i couldn’t help but wonder if i could make it into that school. i was seriously worried that i wouldn’t be able to make it into a college like nazareth, when i have a gpa above 3.75 in high school right now with multiple college-level classes. it’s just ridiculous for me to be so worked up about it, but here i am freaking that i’ll only be able to get into a community college (nothing against community colleges, i just want to shoot a little higher, ya know?).

i just don’t understand why i have to think about everything i don’t have, rather than the things that i have going for me. it’s like i just let Pastor Oden’s sermon from 3 sundays ago go in one ear and out the other, i swear. i try, i really do, but it’s just so hard to look at what i have and use that, instead of focusing on what i don’t have and whining about it. i need to just sit back for a minute, and think to myself, wow, you have a lot going for you, you should really share this with everyone around you. but it’s like the part of my brain that says these things is only on like an hour out of the day, and the rest of the time there’s a part screaming, you can’t do this, you can’t do that. even now i’m whining about what’s wrong with me rather than what’s right with me.

right now, i’m going to take a vow for myself. i’m going to swear to myself that i will go one week without letting any negative thoughts affect how my day goes. i know that it’s impossible to not have negative thoughts, but i’m going to try for just a week to be uber-positive about myself. i don’t know if i can do it, but i’m sure if i put myself up to it, i’ll get pretty darn close.

and since it’s 11:30 and i should have gone to bed 2 hours ago, i’m going to go to sleep. peace out!

my quest towards adulthood has begun.

over the past two weeks, i have begun the process of visiting colleges and trying to decide which one i will give four years’ salary to, as well as trying to decide what i am going to do at that school that will evolve into the career i will hold for the rest of my life. when i was younger, especially as a freshman in high school, i always thought this would be easy. i thought that the right college would just pop out at me from one of their letters, and i would just know, or something like that. and i was always sure that i would know when the time came which niche i would settle into for the rest of my life.

but then again, kids are stupid.

i have only visited both colleges, and i loved both of them, but for completely different reasons. st. john fisher had the perfect “everybody here’s a rockstar” attitude, and everything on campus was shiny and new (kind of pathetic how shinyness is going to affect which college i go to eh?). it was that laid-back, everybody knows everybody atmosphere that made me feel that st. john fisher was easily a place i could live at for four years. nazareth, however, had the perfect education system for me, allowing me to be certified as a high school teacher while at the same time doing a double major in english and psychology or philosophy. that amount of education for that price tag is pretty impressive, and more than enough reason to go to nazareth.

but even though both schools had their merits, one’s shortcomings were another’s strengths, making it so hard to choose between the two.

but even more important than the question of where, is the question of what. as a junior in high school, i always assumed that i would have it all figured out by now. i always thought that by the time i had to start finding a place to further educate myself for four years, i would know what i would educate myself about. to be honest, i haven’t the slightest idea what i want to do. i want to do so much, but when i start to think about doing that same thing for forty years, i start to think… umm, maybe this isn’t for me. and so i just move from major to major, never settling, always trying to figure out where i belong in the adult world. and the fact that i don’t know scares the hell out of me.

as i sit in the auditoriums during my college visit, i chew on the end of the free pen they gave me, and have a silent panic attack. i hate going into things unprepared, and going to college as an undeclared major just seems lazy to me. i want to know where i’m going before i leave, and not knowing makes me freak out unlike anything else.

i wish that i could just get an answer out of nowhere, just some voice telling me, “Clinton, do this…”. while the idea of voices just speaking to me inside my head is a little weird i’ll admit, i can’t help but wish that it would happen, just to take the weight of the decision off of my back.

my future freaks me out, simply because i don’t know what it holds. i hate not knowing what i want to do with my life, and i hate not knowing where i’m going to do that. i know that just babbling on about it isn’t going to help much, but at least it makes me feel better.

i am a coward.

i hide within my own personal ipod bubble, blocking out the troubles of the rest of the world. my music is my safe haven, the place where i turn when the world gets too scary. instead of facing my fears, i run away from them with the beats and rhythyms of songs singing about what i feel. i listen to these songs without thinking, just letting the music fill the void in my mind and flood out all of my conscious thought. i’m listening to my music right now, just writing whatever comes to the surface past all of the blur of guitars, drums and vocals, instead of facing my ideas head-on.

i hide behind my hip clothes, posing as someone that everyone likes, instead of just being who i really want to be. i laugh along with those laughing at me, just to seem like i’m on their side. i spend much more on clothing than i should, thinking that the bigger the price tag, the more i’ll be liked.

i hide behind the decisions my parents make about my future, just letting my future be decided instead of being who i was born to be. i accept the “inevitable fact” that i will be a teacher, and ignore my true passions for music and theatre, simply because it’s not realistic, or i’m not good enough to get into show biz. my heart lives on the stage, but my mind tells me to stay away for a better future with “financial security” and a “healthy lifestyle”, whatever those mean. i hide from my true self in hopes that the rest of the world will accept the pale facade i put up in my place.

as i go through my life, i stare at who i am and wonder, “what the hell am i thinking, acting like that?” i scream out to myself to be “real”, but i don’t even know what that means. i just keep running like a coward, trying to escape from the inevitable judgment day, where i will have to face myself and decide what i want to be. i keep running in fear, when i could just stop, and be myself, but i’m afraid of stopping, so i keep avoiding myself.

i am afraid of myself. i am a joke. i am a poor excuse for a child of god. i am broken. i am a loser. i am a coward. but at least i am.

each day i find it harder to live in this world.

but each day i also find more reason to live.

today I went to church with my family for the very first time.  Pastor Oden’t sermon was about how we as humans need to stop looking for signs from God, and start being willing to give the little that we have to God.  he spoke about the tale of the loaves and the fishes, and how the disciples could have easily prevented that miracle from happening.  he said that all it would have taken was one of the disciples to say, “Well, if I keep my bread, then I’m sure to eat,” and all of those thousands of people would have gone home hungry.  he said that people concentrate too much on what they don’t have, instead of concentrating on what they have to give to others and to God.

and as Pastor Oden spoke, i started to think about my life, and about whether or not i was keeping my loaves and my fishes to myself.  i try to use my gifts to make better the lives of others, but at the same time, i spend a lot of my time worrying about what is wrong with my life.  instead of concentrating on giving what i have to those around me and to God.

and then the church took communion.  i was embarrassed, but instead of taking communion, i stayed with my parents and did not take communion.  but as i sat there, i instead thought about the significance of communion and the significance of Christ’s sacrifice.  the music that they played while everyone took communion spoke about “my sin that held Him there”, and “my sin that drove the nails”, and i couldn’t help but wonder if it was true.  was it my sin that kept Christ on that cross, either physically or just by the fact that he was there to save me from my sin.  i began to wonder if it was because of me that Christ died.  i was simply dumbfounded to believe that someone i loved so much, and someone that loved me so much was dead because of me, and he still loved me afterwards.  it left me hurt about myself, embarrassed almost, that i could say that i loved Christ while at the same time it was because of me he was dead.  but, more importantly, i felt almost proud that i was so loved by someone, that they would suffer so greatly for me.

so even though i may have felt guilty, i felt the most amazing forgivenness i have ever felt.

over the last few days, and last night especially, something has happened to me that I can’t really explain. i’m a pretty thoughtful person, and it doesn’t take much to get me brooding. but being a part of godspell has done something different to me, something that I’ve never felt before.

through the first act, I’m just acting. sure, with godspell it’s more like having fun with a close group of friends, but it’s acting all the same. and it’s fun for me.

but about halfway through the second act, something happens to me. I’m no longer acting through my head, I’m simply reacting through my heart. sure, I’m still reciting lines and things like that, but I no longer have to think about how my face looks, or what my body language is saying. I’m not listening to my friend philip anymore, either. I’m a disciple of the messiah, listening to some of the most important words ever spoken in history. and when I’m told that I will betray the man behind those words, I’m not acting shocked. i’m cut to the bone, feeling that I have just been told something that has destroyed my world from the very foundations of my soul.

as powerful as that moment is for me, it’s by far not the most powerful. i still don’t understand what comes over me when I see philip acting as if he’s being crucified. my heart breaks, and I’m left an empty shell, left alone like a sheep within a pack of wolves. i become the weakest i have ever been, and as i see the pain in my friend’s face, i feel as if the world should stop right there, and never start again. i don’t think about homework, or about the cute girl in the third row. i don’t even think. I feel.

i feel myself, trembling and small, ready to give up on a world that seems to have no decency. i feel my grandfather, who has been dead since I was six when i saw him die before my eyes. but most amazingly, i can feel god on that worn wooden stage. i can feel him in the lights that beat down on my tortured face, and i can feel him in the hearts and the souls of everyone on that stage. i can feel him, though, most strongly in the stiff, tortured figure above me. i can feel how philip feels, willing but weak, and just filled with the question, why? why me? why them? why you?

it’s a powerful moment, and by far the longest moment I will ever endure. i don’t pretend to know what’s going on on that stage, but i do know that whatever is going to happen, “it’s all for the best”. i don’t know if I can really feel god or not, but at least I can feel a thread of that connection that adam and eve shared with god before the fall. it’s a feeling of respect, and of wholeness. it’s a feeling of assurance, and a feeling that the world could end, but there will still be somewhere to go afterwards. most importantly, it’s a feeling of faith.

now, i’d be the first to admit that i’m not what one would call a “real christian”, who goes to church every sunday and prays for everyone before they go to sleep, but i can say that this musical has changed me like no other. sure it’s a little quirky, yeah, and sure we never have a “perfect” show, but every time we perform this musical, we show a little bit of god to ourselves and everyone around us, just simply by revisiting the idea of Jesus and his disciples.

i can’t by any means speak for my fellow cast members, but i can say that personally, before this musical, i would not have been able to say that i believed in who the bible says jesus was. i just couldn’t comprehend the idea of someone who spent his whole life teaching to mostly deaf ears, and then in the end gave everything up for those who cursed or ignored him. i just simply couldn’t accept that fact. but as I kneel on that stage before god and man and all the rest, i feel whole. i understand. and as the lights dim, i do not fear, but mourn and rejoice at the same time. for my greatest friend in the world has just been tortured to death before my eyes, and I could do nothing about it. but at the same time, i know that my friend will live forever. in the hearts of everyone there, he will live forever. in the minds and the souls of every being that has thought, he will live forever.

in me, he will live forever. and i accept him, not only as my friend and mentor, but as my savior, and as the man who is responsible for the fact that I can sleep comfortably at night. for that brief moment in the great scheme of time, the little speck that is me is allowed to accept everything that ever has and will happen. for that brief moment, i am with god, and god is with me, and i am whole.