Endgame

Right now I'm having something I call; a Senior crisis. As next year will be my last year of high-school and I have zero idea what I'm doing with my life. What classes to take, what clubs should I join, what should I do? Never in my life have I ever had a choice of what classes to take, or even what school to go to. But, now I have that choice and I have no idea how to make them. I just want help, but I'm about to become an adult. I'm about to enter endgame. I need to grow up and make my own choices.

That doesn't help me make them. It's difficult, most of the classes don't make any sense. It took me all day to find out what "drafting," was. Now I have a few days to compile all the information required to choose my final classes possibly forever. As much as I want to go to New York University, time is not on my side. It's just not easy choosing knowing each will sculpt me into the person of tomorrow.

Endgame is a scary thing, it's the end, it's that book finally being closed. It's not like I'm turning the page, or changing the chapter. I'm changing the entire novel. New place, new people, new location, new plots. By this time next year I will be about to embark on a quest across America to meet Virus in person. Before leaving off to New York to enroll into NYU and begin the life I feel I was destined to do. But, with every ending comes a twist.

Somebody is going to die. I can feel it, it started a year ago getting stronger and stronger. I can imagine all the people in Jason's web he could hurt, all the people I wouldn't expect, and all the obvious ones such as my accident prone father. The thing is it's almost destiny, I had a recurring dream back when I was younger of my step brother murdering my father in cold blood and years later the moment was nearly recreated except poor papa Piper had a heart attack.

That's what really worries me - what is Jason's plan that is so close to unfolding? It doesn't matter if he's real or fake It depends on what I decide, and I'm not ready to make that choice. In the end if he's real, he's been real this whole time, but if not then I'm crazy. My choice will never change that fact of life no matter the outcome. But, if Jason is real then I can't help but worry what he's been up to this entire time of flowing through my brain.

That brings up a whole new addition, the future isn't what I'm afraid of. It's the present becoming the past. Once this moment is gone I know I'll never get it back. My choices don't really matter if they're swapped away before I get to make them. This entire month was never about me begging to skip, it's never about me wanting to pause the moment, it's never about me wanting to go back. It's all about me wanting to live the moments. Why make a choice if it results in nothing? Don't worry about tomorrow, worry about losing today. This moment, is the best moment, because it's still here.

Charizard to the Present!

This entire month I been talking about time stopping, pausing, and fast forwarding. I mentioned the future, the past, but never the present. Currently, I just finished the greatest project I was ever part of; Shrek the Musical. My step dad changed jobs, my step sister has returned to live with us for a few weeks and possibly the entire summer, and I made plans with Reed, Zeus, and Gem which made me realize something. In the mix of everything I had forgotten about my Pokemon, having fun, and overall my Charizard.

I wish I could say I had time now, but with homework, writing projects, and friends in my life I don't have much time at all. I could always wait twenty or so days until school is over, but there is one huge proublem with that. It's the future. With that attitude I couldn't ever get anything done. If I keep pushing things off to tomorrow they'll never become today. How in the world do I change that?

I could just play. It's almost crazy to think about dropping everything I'm supposed to do, but in reality all those things I'm supposed to do are things I can do tomorrow. That leaves me at another dilemma. If I push those tasks to tomorrow, I won't get them done today. Now I'm stuck, because there isn't any way for me to get everything done in one small single day. So that leaves me with little options but to do what I always do. 

I could do nothing, nothing at all. Instead of  doing some of what I want, some of what I need, all of what I want, or all of what I need.. I usually end up doing none of the above. My poor little Charizard doesn't get his tummy rubbed yet again, his little tail eventually burning out after nine years of trying to keep it's fire alive. Poor, Poor Charizard. What choice do I make? Play it or do nothing? It will greatly impact the sake of my poor Charizard. 

Luckily, for me there is a third option. I choose priorities. I take what I need to do today, and what I want to do today. Everything else is okay to put off until I have more time or it becomes more important. So I can write, do some homework that's due, and then turn around and play some good ole Pokemon! Because, if I don't my Charizard will be lost in tomorrow forever. I think I'm done living in the past or living in the future. The present needs me more after all. 

Gathering of the Generation

I have completed the two shows of the musical at my school as I helped work backstage, and my mess ups weren't a big deal. I did have a couple panic attacks almost bailing on the show completely. It was the first time I've ever done anything with that much pressure. One single mistake could ruin the entire show and while we did make some nobody really noticed. Not even my sister who is back in town for the next few weeks and will be sleeping on our couch. It appears as if her sister will also be coming down for this summer and possibly the school year. That sister is hundreds of miles away and she's coming all the way here.

Is this the gathering of our generation? Or at the very least people I know. By the end of next summer, not the one coming up, I will have seen all the people who were ever "main characters," which brings up a completely new situation. This story seems to end in New York which I plan to go to after visiting Virus after graduation. I feel as if everything is building up for something like some master plan.

Either way, it's just really cool to have a group of friends. Carlos, Reed, Zeus, Gem, Virus, and some of their friends could be called mine as well. Never have I imagined so many new characters - as well as old ones - to be surrounding me and making up this story I call my life. It's funny now that I look around, I stopped acting like me and started to be pied piper and now I have friends and have fun! Now that's magic.

 If you noticed I left Gem in there, I been eating lunch with her and while a relationship is out of the question I don't feel I should kill our friendship. I needed reminding that it's okay to relax and have a few laughs with friends even if it means abandoning other ones. The proublem with Gem is she isn't always on my level of understanding things, especially my sense of humor, yet she can handle my autistic quirks the best. Somehow Gem can tame my inner duck, and I'd be a fool to let that waddle away.

Twenty days remain until I end Junior year, entering the summer leading up to my final year of high-school. I have almost no idea what I'm going to do with my life. For the past ten years or so I wanted to be an author for a published book, preferably by time I was sixteen. Well, here I am and no story has been successfully written. It's that that started to give me doubts, but when a teacher I had for a Media Arts class asked the class, "Why are you here? If this isn't what you want, why are you here?" and at that moment I realized I didn't want this. In the case I change my mind let's not burn down that tree yet.

I had a friend a while back who reminded me that I shouldn't use my thoughts to follow me, I should trust myself a bit more. To follow my emotions lead me to the realization that while I love writing it's not what I want my career to be. But, in that mix I also came to the conclusion I don't know what I want. I don't know who I am. I only know who I want to be. Luckily, my friends or this entire generation doesn't have a clue either so it's okay. I'll figure it out, with my friends by my side, because that's what they're there for.

Countdown

Waiting, is a terrible feeling to experience especially when it's a few days before a big show that will greatly alter the ending of the story. With time ticking down I can't help but ponder on what could possibly go wrong, then I wake up in the middle of the night with a sore throat. Like, bad sore throat. Not so much that I couldn't do the show, but more to where I need to be sure not to get the rest of the cast sick. For once in my life I don't want to "wait for it," I want to get it on the road and drive this puppy home.

There are plenty of other things going on that cross with this plot, so many side story lines that could take the lead. Like, my father having a tooth surgery tomorrow, Reed about to graduate, Gem and I still being friends despite my attempts, Virus planning my visit, and Zeus dating a new girl who I've yet to meet up close, but she seems nice from online. Not to mention all the mental stability quirks I have that seem to only be getting much worse as I'm sleeping less and working more with the backstage drama class.

I know I've covered that pausing and skipping is not only impossible, but unwise. Except in this case I know what happens in the future and while I don't want to skip over it, because it'll be a memorable moment for me, I do want to fast forward to it. I don't want to wait for this sickness to pass. I just don't want to wait for tonight to pass. For tomorrow to drag on by. Knowing what happens next makes waiting for it so much more difficult.

Time is ticking down on me, my wasted seconds are being eaten away, but instead it feels as if time is stopping to pee on each and every piece of grass. Why does time slow down? Things seem to speed up when you're having fun, but slow down when you're waiting on something? Wouldn't that prove that time is simply an illusion of our minds connected to our mental and emotional state? So does time exist at all?

That's something you have to ask yourself, something I can't figure out on my own. It's more of an opinion based question as it's impossible to test. All I know is I have a countdown over my head ticking down at the slowest pace possible and while I may want it to speed up once it's here I'll wish to go back. I get the feeling after this show goes up in flames, likily because of me, all I want to do is rewind.

The Thirteen Trees

Remember a few weeks back when I said I only have nine possible endings to my story? I lied, there are actually thirteen trees. Imagine an forest that has thirteen trees of different colored leaves with hundreds of branches branching off of each, which branch into other branches, colliding with each other. All the other trees in the forest are dead or burned not connecting to anything but the ground. Those thirteen trees are surrounding me, you, us, and we have to pick a path but we keep getting pushed back and forth.

The problem is once we pick or fate picks for us there isn't any turning back, the ground and the remaining trees will be engulfed in the flames. All we could do is climb as high as we could until either reaching the top or fall to the ever so written demise. All we can do is try our very best to take the future we want most all while conciser if we could survive that climb. If we, if I, can survive any of them.

A few years back Jason had me stay up late so I could draw a picture of trees and it was the only thing I've ever drawn that looks good. It showed at least twenty paths but he told me that each one would die until only a few remained. By the next morning I would find the notebook to be missing all together where I would have never find it again. I did find a red notebook like it two years later but it was empty. So I'm going to look at all my possible endings that I didn't already mention;

The Dead End 

Perhaps, I'm meant to work at a photo studio or a teacher like my mother always wanted for herself. So I get a job, but it's not what I want in life and I'm never happy. Even if I get something to do with writing or even if I come to enjoy my work I'd be stuck. This ending isn't so bad though, it has it's advantages. I don't mind being a controlled rat running miles for the cheese at all! No, I want to be a puppet with super glued strings.

The Sixth Sense

In my first post in this blog I mentioned the word "mystic," but I never followed up on what it was about. Basically sometimes I know things I very well shouldn't usually from the words of Jason, but sometimes almost like common knowledge. In this ending I don't only develop that possibly impossible gift, but I use it to become a prophet like I explained in "Skip, Skip," but if it's correct I'm pretty sure I either get my head bashed in or die eating some really cheesy pizza when I'm in my forties.

The Wild Card 

This is that one where everything turns out to be a time traveling conspiracy or when aliens are taking over the world. It's that ending that doesn't make sense, but turns out to be true. The ones that don't have any evidence to back up, for example the "Tale Time Traveling Jacket," is a wild card. But, Jason is backed up on proof that I can prove to others so he isn't a wild card. From now on I'll start a WC series debunking all the weird things that happen to me as a wild card or evidence. If this ending happens I'd do flips backwards.

The New York Conspiracy

It appears my cousin, my best friend Zeus, Reed, and even Virus all have plans to venture through New York city around the same time I do. To me that very concept seems fixed, as these numbers that are everywhere in my life are the zip-code. How long with seven eighteen haunt me? This ending is the most likily then any of the other thirteen because it's what I want. Not for the answers. Not for Jason's will. Not for my friends. Because, it's destiny and you can't avoid destiny.

The End

No matter which path my story takes it will still be the end, even if all of the above happens. All of the trees could burn down leaving room for a tree with every path. I could become an author, visit Virus, and go to NYU while developing a psychic energy. Endings are hard though, hard to get just right. Through graduation and turns of events it seems like every character in my little tale will be in the same place at the same time. Whatever my fate is - destiny is at play.

Case of the Quirky Duck

Quack, quack, quack, quack.

What's that? You don't speak duck? Me either, but I do speak quirks almost professional. It's a mixture of my High Function Autism and my newly diagnosed Bipolar traits. When I was told both of those things I shivered in my feathers. Just the fact that something was actually wrong with me threw me for a curve ball. In fact when the autism came up I waddled back and forth for hours pacing.

This is what keeps me from doing what I want - even going to New York may lead to complications despite the destiny involved. So far working backstage on Drama has been a killer as I'm barely able to stay useful all while worrying about breaking things, again. If it wasn't for me being one of the only stage crew to regularly show up I'm sure they would have fired me. It doesn't seem like I'll be able to hold down a serious job much like my father or grandmother. I'll need to be on disability if I ever want to pay the bills.

Most of my flaws boil down to when I'm around other people, I don't do well in flocks but I'm better on a one on one. If I'm alone with someone we can become good friends but if others are around I'm awkward and nervous. If you got to know me I would be able to tell the appropriate jokes at the appropriate time. At least I would try to, but when in a group it doesn't work out the same way. I'm also much better with drakes then normal ducks as explains my complicated relationship with Gem.

Despite my flaws though, and there are a lot of them, there are still a lot of good qualities about me. I'm clever, friendly, clean, respectful, helpful, good at writing, brilliant with ideas, and when it comes down to it I'm reliable. Even though I'm not handling everything right now somehow it'll all turn out okay. As the clock for the show ticks down things will heat up but according to the my history they won't go up in flames. I'll explain, let me tell you a little tail.

Once upon a time in the big pond of a dangerous city fate was at play. As it turns out my step father had the smart idea of cutting down a tree without telling anyone he was out there. If it wasn't for me being called out there by Jason's wishes my step dad would have likily died that day. When the branch came down, trapping him underneath, I acted. Normally I wouldn't even touch a tree avoiding the texture and germs it would give off but here I didn't think I just did. Luckily a year later he was able to help create a beautiful duckling. It's almost as if Jason had caused the accident for his own plans, but let's not get ahead of ourselves here we'll get to that.

All I'm saying is when things come down to it, I follow through. Not always with my stories, my chores, or even remembering to eat but if the stakes were high enough I'm sure I'd write that book, clean the house, or eat an entire buffet. So when the play comes around, despite my flaws, I'm sure I'll figure it out. Even if I have to take over for Reed as I'm now his understudy. Time is running short on that one.

Time is always running out, especially now, as I have five days until I have to step up to the plate and swing hoping for a home run. Or kick that ball through the hoop or throw the not-so-pig-skin throw the broken fork. Yeah, I don't know much about about sports. Point is I may be duck, falling on my beak due to my webbed feet but in the end I'll stand up and I'll soar higher then I ever have flown before. In five days I will wobble across stage and flip those panels. In five months I will begin my Senior year where I will graduate no matter what. In five years I will have published my first book or be finishing up college. Within these past five minutes I have crafted and solved the greatest mystery of all time, I solved the case of the quirky duck.

Skip, Skip

There I was in the moment to end my friendship with Gem when it happened. The same thing happened when I arrived at dress rehearsal only to find the rest of stage crew failed to arrive, after only my first week, I was put to the test. It happened before when a tree had fallen onto my step dad nearly killing him. All those moments were skipped into one small second that seems to have slipped away from my grasp. In my last blog I learned I couldn't travel back into time - or even freeze the moment - but nobody said I couldn't use one more skip card?

Come my graduation year I will be heading towards my destiny, wherever it lies. So much will be happening that I can't even comprehend it all. For one I'll be starting up a club, trying to anyway, that's for writing at school. Secondly, I'm started to work on a big project that involves taking my favorite characters and story lines from past stories combining them into one big story. Thirdly, I'm trying to re-sing all the quirky songs I've come up with over the years but sense I'm a terrible singer it'll be for people I know close or maybe I'll post it on here. Finally, Zeus and I are going to be heading to visit Virus a few days after graduation passes.

So it makes sense why I would want to fast forward through all the complications I been dealing me lately. In the future I won't have to worry about the future because it'll be the future. At least that's what I want to think. The truth is this moment right now was once the future I so forth worried about. The only difference is I know what happens now but I won't know about next week or next month. So let's skip this entire scene, let's not chicken out or mess up in Drama anymore.

To the future!

Finally here at my Senior and final year of High Schools! It's been a crazy ride to get here but I sure am glad it's finally reaching it's end. I have begun a group at writing school I call "Spirit's Fire," and it's really hit off! At least seven people have already signed up so it looks like it'll be a big hit. I've already neared finishing my music collection, and my huge big story is way ahead of plan. So much so I could start it now. I even started going to the gym over the summer so I'm so much more in shape. The best part is I have all my friends beside me. 

Except, I don't. Zeus has become pretty serious with this girlfriend of his that he barely has any time for me even during school hours. Reed is currently off  working on his training duties for the United States Army. Gem has switched to a career tech school and no longer wants anything to do with me. Carlos hasn't been the same sense the innocent he experienced over the summer. And, HP doesn't seem to return my messages. 

With my all other activities taking over I haven't been able to keep up with my schoolwork and started to fall behind. I'm on the urge of giving up now that I have to take gym this upcoming semester. Something I've weaseled myself out sense seventh grade. Now I'm being told I don't have enough credits to graduate at all... This future isn't far enough to reach my happy ever after. 

To the future!

Today is the day I been working towards all my life, the day I graduate. Sitting in the crowd are my parents, all my siblings, my grandmother, my aunts and uncles, my grandparents, my cousins, and sitting way in the back is my father with a proud smile planted on his face. Zeus standing not far from me in his own red robe giving me a thumbs up as my name is called. Even Reed has taken a break from his army training to watch me grab that diploma. Everyone I care about is here watching the moment my life takes a drastic leap.

Just a few days later I traveled half way across the country to find Virus with my best friend Zeus and his fiance. After the long bus ride we stay in a hotel that night, watching funny movies, and being the three musketeers we're always meant to be. Come morning we each greet Virus at long last but it takes a while to get over the nervous tension. When it's all over we go out to eat before testing jelly and jello to see if they're similar.

After a week we return home to find a trip to New York awaiting us where I sign up to go to NYU. It's then that my favorite people I've met over the years, my greatest friends, all move in around me and go to similar schools within the city. But, then we all become so busy that we barely see each other. It's then that Zeus is drastically hit by a bus leaving him paralyzed. This future isn't as good as I thought it would be... let's speed it along.

To the future!

It's been a few months sense college started to go south and I was forced to drop out. Virus had to return back home because she said I was holding her back. It's been two years and Zeus is still unable to fully move his body. The thing is I knew this would happen from visions back when I was a child so this is completely my fault. There was only one thing I could possibly do now; I shaved my head and began to live as a non-religious monk.

It was then that my psychic abilities came in full throttle and I was able to become a prophet. But, problems persisted when nobody believed my visions until it was far too late. Then, they blamed me for the disasters that followed. I wasn't just friendless but now I was on the run from the law so I had to do something. I let Jason, the voice in my head, take control and what he did with it is out of my realm of possibility. A mixture of destiny and insanity. Because, it's then that I lost all commission. The future is a dark place, can we go back?

To the past!

Second guessing things here guys, perhaps the future isn't all it's cracked up to be? It'll still have it's own problems and complications. I'll still be waiting for the future until at one point I will beg to return to this exact moment. This wasted moment that I'm using by sitting here typing a blog nobody will read while a fan blows onto my face. Wasting away my Saturday instead of working on any of my senior plans. Instead of working on my skip I'll remain in the present enjoying this wasted moment. 

Tale of the Time Traveling Jacket

The future is a dark and scary place but in the end we all know that we're heading towards some sort of future, as time is always moving forward. Unless time isn't all that simple, if time is simply an object of our imagination or something that we can alter. Throughout my life I have undergone many struggles, never having the capability to make any of my own decisions but now was the moment of where everything and everyone was waiting on me to make a choice. Now is the time full of both the good and bad. For now I just need to hit that big pause button. 

Currently the voice in my head and I are for the first time ever at a temporary truce in the middle of our war, which he is currently winning. If this continues he will either break my remaining bricks of sanity or force his way into the real world wrecking havoc in his mists.

Secondly, Gem and I sort of have plans tomorrow except I really don't want to go. As I started before I don't want to be with her or even continue this false friendship we have in tact. Every time I try to explain my reasoning she tells me how great of friends we are together. When morning comes I either have to suck it up and suffer or tell her the deepening truth.

The third reason is the website I'm on just nominated me member of the month. It's a huge honor but I know in sometime I'll come to mess it up. For the first time ever I have found a place where I'm truly happy, even if it exists online, but the better things seem to go the worse they have to get. If this moment was frozen forever I could always cherish it.

Next on the list is the practice show for my Drama class coming up the sixth, nobody seems prepared and my only allies involved seemed to have fallen off their rails. I don't get the impression that Zeus is as excited about the play as I had originally thought and I'm worried that he's not making the best decisions. Even if he's truly okay like he claims he still doesn't seem to want to be involved which scares me that he'll do something hectic. Not to mention that Reed has been off his game the past few days due to the teacher stressing him out past his limit.

Finally, I know I'm reaching one of those endings I described in "Cut and Finish," and eventually the end of my story. I'm not ready to face any possible closer to the book I been living all these years but eventually I'll have no choice. It's sort of scary once you look at all the possibilities and come to a concision of what you want. I know what I want guys, I want to go for it, but it just seems so far out of reach. If the universe would do me a favor and take a break for a while I would be more then pleased.

Except, it can't. Time cannot stop for one single person no matter how much we wish it can. That doesn't mean that time cannot go back though, changing something we didn't even think we could change. I have a story to share with you all about the time an object of mine traveled through time in a mind shattering moment for my tiny brain. It's the Tale of the Time Traveling Jacket!

Back in middle school I had a grey hoodie that I would wear everywhere, it was something I rarely took off and barely ever washed. Despite my obsession I would constantly lose it, leaving it behind in nearly ever class. That's where the story of the time traveling jacket started on that fateful day, heading down the hallway is when we saw it...

Let's back up for a second to a few months ahead when life was heading down a spiral of confusion. I started a innocent middle school relationship for starters, my mom had just gotten out of jail six months prior, and my father decided to drop the bombshell that he's secretly an angel. At that point in my life I believed him and I was looking for something to believe in.

All in all that could have been my reasoning behind what happened, but no matter how much sociology I try to interpret into it I still believe that this jacket had traveled through time. It seems every time I tell this little tale every one considers it as a childhood act of fiction. If that was the case I wouldn't be so obsessed with it. It's like the entire thing was plotted out against me from the beginning.

Let me explain, there was this girl I felt I had a crush on back in elementary school without realizing those feelings weren't at all what I thought, they felt like we had a connection. Sometimes we'd have the same dream, she'd tell me about it while I was all the same freaking out because it was near to exactly like mine except from her point of view. This girl was beside me in the hall that day so she'll always be important to me, even if we fell out of touch. But, I was right about the fact we had some sort of connection. Later she became my step sister for a few months, but that's a story for later.

The three of us ventured down that hall to find a small grey jacket which we quoted was much like mine, the one I was wearing at the time, and how it was a mere coincidence. As the day went on I found to have lost my poor hoodie a total of three times. When I left it in my last class of the day I ran back to get it only to find it wasn't there. I was one of the last people to leave, my teacher was still there, and he said nobody took it. Well, when I retraced all my steps I ended up finding it on that window seal. The same position it was this morning, with my name on it, but my friends didn't think it was strange at all.

For years I couldn't get it out of my head as to why that could have happened but later a similar moment happened. I discovered that music was the key and that freezing time was possible. It usually happens when I try meditating or have to wait a long time where the same song seems to play forever until an hour has passed or an event came to an end. So manipulating time is possible but it's simply an illusion of the mind. That is unless some external force is trying to toy with me in some sick game I cannot control. What if that game is simply the realization of how life works? If that's the case I have to face my past, my future, and of course my present.