Is That Life?

At nineteen years of age sometimes you have to look back and just wonder - is that all there is to life?

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Dear journal,

You know my life isn't actually as bad as I sometimes make it seem, that I am almost certain of. But sometimes, you just have to tell the truth, tell things exactly as they are, without holding back, and when all I have to talk about are the bad times then yes, I am sure my life looks absolutely awful. But, it's not really.

Sometimes I wake up and wonder why I am even bothering to get out of bed. I stare at the ceiling and ask myself if it is really worth it. If £5.50 an hour is enough for a job that's never going to take me anywhere. If I have the mental ability to face another row between my parents. If there is any point to my existence at all.

I lie in bed and try to figure out how much longer I can pretend to be asleep where I don't have to think about these things before I am going to make myself late for work. And I realise that it's 9:15 and I have half an hour before I need to be leaving and I need to get petrol, that means leaving at 9:35 because the garage will be a nightmare. And I need to have a shower... Oh, and I need to go the post office and post that very important letter. And I have no choice but to get up and rush through these things. Undoubtedly coming close to an RTA at least once a day either on the way to work or on the way home because the roads are killer, and no one cares about how fast they go. (Yes, I will admit I can drive those roads too fast as well)

And I spend the next eight hours of my day staring blankly at a disgusting yellow wall, thinking about what I am doing with my life, counting the days until I start Uni and how hopefully my life will be a bit better then. My thoughts interrupted from time to time by a group of customers coming in and I go through the motions: "Two adults and one child? That's £20.60 then please." "Thank you very much, £4.60 change and your receipt and here is a copy of our programme. Thank you, have a good day."

And the few times I ask myself what I am doing in this job I just have to remind myself that I could be back in my old job where I really had to work for my £3.65 an hour. At least the pay here is acceptable, I'm just sick of being bored. And I have worked through so many Puzzler books and Sudoku puzzle books that I have a whole draw of them at work! So, if anyone can think of something I can do at work to keep me occupied and stop me getting so bored, I am very open to suggestions.

Then at 6pm I leave, drive back home (possibly narrowly avoiding the daily RTA if it didn't happen in the morning) and sit outside the house in my car for a while, wondering whether I really want to go inside and face whatever is in there. Especially if dad's car is in the drive.

Go inside, and every now and then everyone is trying to be normal, and act like there is nothing wrong, when there blatantly is, and other times doors are slamming and adults are screaming at each other like pre-school children. And I just slink upstairs to my room, muttering something vague in greeting to these so called responsible adults, trying to work out if there is anywhere I can go, or anything I can do to stop myself having to go through this. There is a part of me that just wishes they would split up, get a divorce and get over it, because coming home to this is like some kind of torture.

But anyways, I suffer through dinner, my little sister eating three peas at a time with two spoonfuls of gravy per three peas, therefore taking half an hour to east a regular serving, making faces like she is eating poison as she goes. And if anyone dares say anything to her then Dad'll give them hell, it's not at all obvious she's favoured and spoilt. And all I want to do is run away, because the tension gets worse and worse until Dad snaps, shouts and my brother to clear the table, gets up, slams the dining room door and goes to watch his evening's worth of soaps.

And after dinner I return to my room to watch TV, talk to friends on Yahoo! Mobile and shut out my real life. But by doing so I find myself wanting my fantasy life more and more. A life where I can run to someone for a cuddle when it gets too much, where they cuddle me back and we sit and talk about it for a while and then everything is ok. If only it could be that simple and that easy. If only there were someone I could talk to and cuddle like that...

Through all this shitty stuff, and I know it seems petty and stupid and like I am blowing everything out of proportion, I find myself wanting more and more to just not be alone any more. Something I know I will never achieve with my life running like it is. I don't socialise and while all my college mates are at Uni I don't go out.

And then there is Him, who to my complete amazement has managed to completely strip me of all self consciousness and subsequently my clothes! More than once...

And so, yes, life really isn't as bad as I something make it out to be. Just sometimes it's really bad, and that's usually when I just want that person to turn to.

Is that life?