In Search of the Meaning of Fun.

My days consist of school, dance, sleep, and homework.  Honest.  Awake at 6:47-6:52, Arrive at school at 8.  Get out of school at 3:30, get home at 4.  Go to the bathroom, choreograph and work for dance, eat, homework, and be at dance 5:30 or 6.  Dance for three or four hours, and be home at 9-10-11 pm, and crash.  It’s starting to get old.  My Saturdays begin at 8:36-8:41 am I wake up, and be at dance to help teach Pre-K at 10-11, and go to the grocery store with my mom and get home at about 4/5 pm.  I usually have work to do at dance so I don’t get home on time.  Sunday I teach 2-3:30, so I wake up at 10, homework and bum around until 12:30, then get to dance at 1:45.  At 3:30 I often teach privates, or work on my solos or other choreography since I have the studio to myself.  I usually get home 6 or 6:30.  I’m then too exhausted to do anything, so I bum around and do homework and worry about college until I go to bed at 10:30.  Fridays are my days off- my parents take me to the grocery store and I get home at 6 or so, and then I do house chores until I go to bed- I used to talk on the phone a lot.  This weekend I have a dance competition ASAP after school on Friday, Saturday morning until Saturday night and all Sunday.  I don’t have school on Monday- I think I will sleep through the day. 

I am sixteen.  And this is my legacy. 

I have begun not to talk.  I used to be a very loud, vociferous person, full of life and energy.  I am catatonic at school.  My dance progress is slowing.  I am exhausted.  There’s no break in sight- dance recital is coming up in a few months, and I have to get my dances in shape, and learn some twenty odd dances. 

The love of my life went to Iraq on Friday.  I didn’t get to talk to him before he left.  He sent me two or three emails in the two month period before he left.  He said when he came back he wanted to marry me.  But I didn’t talk to him before he left, and honestly… I didn’t want to.  I didn’t want him to go, but I don’t want to hurt because it’s something neither of us can control.  It isn’t my fault.  It isn’t HIS fault.  We love each other.  And I don’t want to think about it, and I don’t want to even acknowledge that he’s gone, that he’s in danger, but I can’t stop thinking about it. 

I am in pain.  And this is my story.

I have no money to pay for anything anymore and neither does my family.  I love htem to death.  But I want to be female.  I want to go shopping.  I want to go to the movies.  I want to go out to eat… but I will pay for my dance lessons, because I want to dance, and then I don’t have to worry about such frivolous things because I am in dance, anyway. 

My best friend is going through some "No one wants me" phase.  I don’t know how to help, and I’m too preoccupied with thinking about everything I need to do before the day ends to even try.  I feel really bad.  I love her like a sister, but there’s nothing I can do for her now.  I am not strong right now, but I can’t tell her.  I just can’t tell her. 

I can’t tell her that every day I struggle to make it to bed that night. 

Spring Break is in two weeks.  I can’t fucking wait.  I don’t have dance, so I’ll probably only be up there a few days through the break.  I need to rediscover hte meaning of fun.  I need to do something with friends, and stop trying to take out my stress through pressuring my body into doing such taxing things that it won’t function. 

What friends?  I don’t have time for friends.

But honestly, I shouldn’t be complaining at all—- I chose this life, and I wanted this life, and I want this life, and I love to dance.  I chose this dance when I started dance at three, and competing at seven, and teaching at 12-13 years old.  I chose it.  And I will do my damnedest to make it all work.

But I’m so tired…

My brain is so done with all of this stress it’s completely not funny.  Maybe next year I should take less than three college courses.

I think I might just be an idiot. But all I want to do is acheive my dream and be a dancer. 

Why is everything that you want so fucking hard to get????

—Inmate—