fools---gold

[fools---gold]

their scars had healed and their hearts kept beating, her heart stopped as hers kept bleeding

[fools---gold]

Fuck "Tradition"

I’m sitting in my government class and we are discussing the outcome of the election. There are so many issues, including but not limited to immigration and foreign policy, education, guns, abortion, and the lgbtqia+ community, which have been brought up. Each topic receives argument and debate from multiple people. But when the matter of transgenders and the equal rights they have are addressed, this ignorant boy whom I called my friend and had much respect for responded, “Letting these people use the restrooms they want and because they think they are of a certain gender will only lead transgenders the opportunity to rape the opposite gender.” First of all who in the fuck are you? Are you fucking kidding me?! But he doesn’t stop there, he says, “This isn’t traditional.” I turn and look at three of my friends who have supported the lgbtqia+ community and am in utter disbelief. How could someone who is so smart say something so fucking ignorant and so disrespectful?? Hahaha you’re right! All transgenders suffer from a life of discomfort with who they are only to finally accept the fact that they want to change their gender to rape people. Never have I ever been so disappointed with the fact that people can be so shielded by parents and friends to think in the ways they do.

I hate how people look at others as “different.” What happened to, “We’re all in this together.” And not the High School Musical version, but the version in where we all protect each other from bullying and harassment? What happened to tolerance? Or freedom?

Does he know that people who are part of this community suffer higher rates of major depression, anxiety disorder, conduct disorder, and co-occurring psychiatric disorders than their “straight” peers. Does he know of the high rates of victimization these people face? Three quarters of people who identify themselves within the community report verbal abuse and about one in seven report physical attacks. Many people in this “traditional” society face severe family rejection and are eight times more likely to attempt to commit suicide.

So again, he’s right. Can you not see? Transgenders only exist to rape others.

How have we come to this?

May I have patience and not kill this boy. My respect is gone.

[fools---gold]

Never Grow Up - 2004 I am four-years-old and dreaming of being a veterinarian and an astronaut and a singer and an olympic gymnast. Yet, I am told that to become a vet and an astronaut that I would have to be extremely smart and be in school for an extensive amount of time; I am told that not many people succeed. I am told that few people attain a career as a singer; I am told that there are too many people out there who know how to sing well. I am told that I am not built to be a gymnast; I am told that activities like that put too much strain on the body. So, I smile and say, “Okay,” even though all of the dreams in which my little heart has envisaged have been crushed. Why is everyone speaking for me? Everything Has Changed - 2008 I am eight-years-old and I am feeling more independent than ever. But my life is changing faster than I can blink. I no longer wake up to see my mom’s pool of blonde locks next to mine. I no longer feel my mother’s welcoming arms or hear her benevolent voice reading out The Notebook before dinner. My father is thousands of miles away on an agonizing military deployment; this would make it deployment number three. I am with family but they feel foreign to me. I know their names and their faces; I have spent few holidays with them and family dinners are even more rare. For the first time I feel alone. Why does everyone keep asking if I am okay? Do they know? Can they not see how my hips stick out a little bit more than usual? How my once always tight jeans are now baggy? Can they not see the permanent redness in my eyes? Nevertheless, I smile and act as if nothing is wrong. Summer is over and I am now in fourth grade. A new school and a new set of friends, nothing I have not had to deal with before, right? At least now, I have a voice. Mean - 2010 I am ten-years-old and my life is a play. There is so much “pretending.” I have a new brother, mother-figure, and baby sister in my life. Everything happened so fast. I ponder the fact that my loved ones should encourage me to be myself and to not let others put me down for who I am. I do not not mean to, but how am I supposed to know better? I have been hiding it for two years now. My family continues to tell me to be myself. Would they continue encouraging me if they knew? The minute someone says something that hurts my feelings, their advice is, “Pretend it doesn’t bother you, don’t let them win. Put a smile on your face and pretend like you are not affected.” But my fight is gone. Why can’t they win? They say you cannot win every battle and what if I am fighting a battle that I do not have the energy for? When my parents are mad at me, I pretend like I am fine. Even though they say that I should always express my feelings and never hold anything in, they never mean how I am feeling towards them because as a “kid,” I am always wrong, and they, as people who are “older and wiser,” are always right. Do I dare mention the fact that they hurt my feelings or made me feel more worthless than the bullies at school? Do I tell my parents the truth, or hold it in to avoid World War III? They constantly bring up every situation in which I have lied, disrespected someone, and they will point out all my flaws. They say, “It’s just a phase. This is not who you are. We didn’t raise you to be like this.” Then where does that leave me? It leaves me in a deeper hole. People ask how I do it so well. “If I were you, I wouldn't be able to function,” they say. I’ve been told my whole life to pretend to do this, to pretend to be that. I am only certain about one thing: I like the long-haired, brown-eyed, tall, redhead girl in my class, my best friend, but I like her as more than just a best friend. Beside this, I am lost and confused. Who am I? I am only the person I pretend to be; the person that everyone else wants me to be; the person they have formed me into. Give me the opportunity to be myself and I will probably just end up even more lost. I would be searching for a person I know nothing about. Speak Now - 2015 I am fifteen and I am caught in an inner-conflict between finding my worth and feeling no self worth. In my Christian household, I will be told that I am a sinner, that I am not a “true Christian.” Since the moment we are born until the minutes leading up to death we are told that we are all special, that we are all unique and beautiful. Now it may seem as though everything written here will contradict this next statement, but that means you’ll be just as confused as I am. With all my heart, I believe that we as humans are put on this earth by a superior power. A power that is to be both feared and loved unconditionally. I believe that every human is made to be beautiful in their own way. So, why then, I must ask, does it feel like I am alone? Why does it seem as though the world is conspiring against me? Why do people's actions beg to be labeled as something other than beautiful? I wish I could answer these questions. I wish someone else could tell me the answers. But, you see, the thing is, there are no real answers. There’s this quote by a man by the name of Khaled Hosseini, a beautiful writer who talks about real problems in the real world. He says, “They say, ‘Find a purpose in life and live it.’ But sometimes it is only after you have lived that you recognize your life had a purpose, and likely one you never had in mind.” On my fingers and toes I can count off the times where I felt as though I was not useful, that I was an outcast. I can count the times where not existing would have felt better than simply breathing. Now do not be fooled, I am not here to say that I am the victim in every situation, because that is far from the truth. I have had my fair share of being tortured, but I have also done quite a bit of torturing to others myself. Everyone has their own troubles, their own mountains to climb. We all just want to live life and be happy, so why is it that so many people seem to not want that for you? I think it all started when they began telling me how “gay” I was. They called me “homo” and “lesbian” and “vagitarian.” I am at the point where I don't know what else to do. I do not care about the colloquial language I use, because in the end does saying what I am trying to say come across any different if I used a higher vocabulary? What is fixing the words going to do? They still mean the same thing and they are still words. People continuously say words are “only words” and they should not hurt you, brush them off because “sticks and stones may break your bones but names will never hurt.” Yet, is it not funny how people are expected to be moved by them? They say “words of wisdom” and “motivational quotes.” How are words supposed to be only positive? There are derogatory words for a reason. Just like there are positively impacting words, there are hurtful ones. We cannot just expect everything in life to be good because not everything in life is good. Nothing in life will ever be perfect. As much as we may try to make ourselves believe it is perfect, we will just end up disappointing ourselves. I am not going to tell you that everything will be okay because not everything will be okay. I would absolutely love to tell you that life is going to be amazing and all your dreams will come true, but then I would be lying. You see my whole life, I have always known I was different. While my older cousins were playing the annual Thanksgiving soccer game, I was yelling on the sidelines for them to pull me in to play, meanwhile all my friends were at home painting their nails and playing with their barbies. While all the kids were playing on the swings during recess, I was reading and taking my own mind to faraway places; places I didn't realize I was at until I came back into what everyone else labels “reality.” And P.S. reality is horrifying. New Romantics - July 2016 I am sixteen and am convinced that I have my life all figured out. Have you ever just sprawled out on the ground outside and looked up at the sky? Do you notice how that no matter how hard you try, you can never count the number of stars? Are you able to wrap your mind around the fact that there are more stars in the sky than there are individual grains of sand in all of the beaches in the world? I know I can’t. I’m laying here thinking about all that has happened in the past week. Let alone in the past three days. On July 20, I officially came out as lesbian to two of my older cousins, two people who are practically my brothers. I have finally accepted who I am. On July 23, I spent the night with the most amazing girl. I explored a world that I had never before been introduced to. To me, she was perfect. She had these eyes that were the most beautiful color. As she tells me, “Okay but this song is one of the best!” for the past 6 songs that we’ve listened to, her eyes fill with this shred of passion and her voice carries a poetic tone. When she’s describing this book that she loves that she thinks I’ll like, she gets this smile that you can’t help but smile back at. Her laugh was so contagious and quickly became one of my favorite sounds. I wanted to kiss her so bad that first night, but I didn’t. Ask me why I didn’t and I could come up with a million excuses. The real answer is simple honestly: just like the thought of the grains of sand and the stars in the sky, I could not fathom the thought of such an amazing person being in my life. I cannot express in words how scary yet exhilarating it is. It felt as if any second she’ll disappear and all I’ll be left with are the traces of her scent on my pillow. As we were lying there, she began to say something and then she stopped, and finally, with a little persuasion, she said what she had intended. She told me to not get too attached. In that moment, with the moonlight glowing on her skin, the curves and shadows creating nothing more than silhouette, I knew that I already had. She told me that she didn’t want to hurt me, but I thought to myself, “It’d be a beautiful tragedy.” Still, I said okay. Then she started talking about how she didn’t want to be hurt by me. But if only she knew how with every word she spoke I fell for her all over again. She said that everyone lies when they say they won’t leave. I’m here and I don’t want to go anywhere. I wish she knew. Nevertheless, I still nod my head and say, “Okay.” I could not picture being anywhere else with anyone else in that moment. All Too Well - August 2016 I was left alone, again. I thought, “There is no way that this is happening again.” I stopped hiding who I was and was comfortable in life and she left me. She said, “It’s not you, I really do like you, but I need time to find myself. I don’t want to be like this anymore.” It was then that I realized that I was not the only girl she was leading on. She had her own little band of girls who followed her around like little puppy dogs, begging for more. While I sat and contemplated all that I had thought that I did wrong, I came to the conclusion that I was not meant to be happy. Any source of happiness I had ever found was ripped from my grasp. “Maybe it’s easier this way,” I thought to myself, “women are always leaving my life.” However, in the darkest hours of the night, I would find myself asking a multitude of questions. Many of them making me feel alone and hopeless. Why is this happening? What is wrong with me? Begin Again - September 2016 It all makes sense, I now know why it never worked out with anyone else. For the first time in a long time, I feel hope. I am happy. I now know what it is like to have something that I want to show off and not be ashamed. I am no longer afraid of the night and the thoughts that came with it, for I know now that my thoughts are always on her and what an amazing person she is. She picked me up when I couldn't find a reason. She became my reason and I know that, despite my flaws and the very danger of being with me, she loves me. I am no longer afraid of what my parents may think about me liking girls. I may not know where I will end up in life, but I no longer have to pretend to be someone I am not. I am no longer ashamed of what I feel. I am no longer ashamed of all the things I had looked at as major flaws in myself. She tells me that I am beautiful and because of her, I am starting to believe it. I know for a fact that I love her and that in itself is enough for me. From here awaits a journey that I am more than eager to pursue.

[fools---gold]

i love you so fucking much and it hurts me because i know that you don’t feel the same. something in my heart tells me that you’re not all in it… but it’s okay.. the story is always different but the ending is always the same. 

[fools---gold]

I hate the fact that you know you’re cute. I hate the fact that you can smile and still fucking make me feel like I’ve fallen for you all over again. I hate the fact that I have to see you and be civil with you when all I want to do is cry. I hate the fact that you can go on living your life when I’m trying to move past this. yes, I’ve found someone else. yes, I think she’s the cutest thing ever. but no offense, still fuck this and fuck the feelings that you knew I had.

[fools---gold]

people always fucking leave

[fools---gold]

You know that moment when you think it can’t get any worse and it does? You know that moment when the only thing you’d been holding onto is gone? You know that moment where you can’t even cry because you should’ve suspected it would’ve happened? You know that moment where for the first time you truly understand what it’s like to be selfless and let it go? You know that moment when every voice inside your head is screaming for you to fight? You know that moment when “It’s not you, it’s me,” finally sticks and you realize that it is you? You know that moment when you don’t know what the fuck to do? You know that moment when you’re completely empty and have no where to turn to? You know that moment when you feel sick to your stomach and it won’t go away? You know that moment when you lie on the floor and just start shaking because you’re just at that point?

Yeah, me too.

[fools---gold]

from the very first “hey,” to the millionth “you’re cute,” you had me hooked. maybe not in the way it was for you but it was a completely different sensation for me. it was a feeling i couldn’t find anywhere else. i always came back to you. even though i didn’t know you well, or really at all, i came back. i would tell you that you’re cute a million times in a row and it was never enough for me. the day i got your number was like a feeling of victory for me.. even with the possibility you wouldn’t feel the same, i would be your friend and that’s what mattered most to me. but the second you told me that you did like me back, my heart exploded and i could feel the smile on my face stretch a mile wide. it wasn’t two weeks later that i kissed you for the first time. and even though you didn’t kiss me back, that’s okay.. everyone needs their time. but from there it was all downhill. yes, you may do stupid shit like message my sort of ex and push me away and say crap you probably shouldn’t, but i wouldn’t want it any other way. every second that i think about being with you, my heart jumps. it’s like one of those cheesy romance movies. and for the first time, i truly understand why it never worked out with anyone else. and for the first time i’m not scared of being hurt. i love you because of the way my name sounds when it rolls off of your tongue. i love you for the way you can’t look at me for more than two seconds without breaking into a smile. i love you for the way you pull me back to kiss me, even when i’m being a brat. i love you for the way your hand fits so perfectly into mine. i love you for the way my heart skips a beat when you pull me close. i love you for the way my breathing pattern changes when you kiss my neck. i love you for the way you talk about music and math. i love you for the way you get jealous even though you know you have no reason to be. i love you for every “i love you” that you say. i love you for making me see so many different things in a whole new light. i love you for putting up with me even though i know that sometimes it is more than difficult. i love you for always telling me to believe in myself when i’ve almost given up. i love you for loving me the way no one ever has before. i love you for listening to me even when i’ve already said what i said a million times before. i love you because when people ask me where i see myself in five, ten, fifteen years, i can only think “with her.” i never knew what they meant when they said “when you know, you know,” until i met you. like it still isn’t crystal clear but that’s okay because it still makes sense. the love that i have for you is unconditional and eternal. i will never ever stop loving you. you are my person and you mean the world to me. i wouldn’t want it any other way. i love you.

reasons why i love you (via b-intergaylactic)

[fools---gold]

Lying here, I don’t know where to begin. I guess I could start with I love you.

You know when you go to an animal shelter and you see all the cute little animals looking up at you and when you pet them you fall in love with them? Well that’s how I feel about you, except times a trillion. When you look at me I forget that there are billions upon billions of other people in this world. I forget that life is extremely hard sometimes. I forget all my worries and fears. When you grab my hand or pull me close my heart explodes at least 13 times. When I’m being stubborn (which most of the time I am) and I’m walking away from you, you pull me in and kiss me and my stomach fills with butterflies. When you talk about Claude, the little boy from Rwanda that you sponsor, I fall in love with you all over again. When you get mad at me for drinking I know it’s only because you care. When you ask me questions about random crap just because it popped into your head, I smile like an idiot because I want to tell you everything.

I’m sorry that I couldn’t remember your favorite movies and I’m sorry that I drank too much and I’m sorry that you feel like I don’t listen to you. My whole life has been love from a distance. But with you, I want to be with you every second of every day. And to be quite honest, I don’t know how the hell to act. So, I know I say a million things that come out wrong. I know I don’t ask you as many questions as you ask me. I know that sometimes, even though you deny it, you feel as though I don’t care. And my love, please, please, please know that I am truly sorry. I’m trying so hard to adjust to this feeling because there has never been anyone in this entire world that I have ever adored as much as you. I love you so much and I’m so sorry that I don’t always show it. But I promise you, I will spend every day of my life proving to you that you are the most important thing to me. And I would do absolutely anything for you.

You are my everything. I’m sorry that I fuck it up sometimes and I’m sorry that I’m a complete idiot. But I love you more than life itself.

Please know this.

I love you.

[fools---gold]

You know it’s funny cuz just the other day you were hittin’ me up Saying, “I’m sorry for the way that I fucked this shit up.” And what you felt with her was amazing, no doubt But little do you know that’s how I felt when we started out All I wanted was your attention Not for you to show me any competition Swore you’d hit me up again, not surprised you never did Now I just find myself walking around shaking my fucking head If you really meant what you said why haven’t I gotten any messages? I do it to myself and it’s funny how That when I take a deep breath and look around I see you in everything and take your imperfections as beauty I die more and more as you steal my affection I promise I know that it isn’t your duty But I wanna be happy Shit this sounds petty Some call me stupid, some call me crazy But fuck it, whatever To me it’s all lucid