"Mine eyes have seen the glory… witnessed creation in it's infancy, and the dying gasp of a universe in its doddering old age. And whenever I try to speak of things as I saw as I plunged headlong through the ages, it starts the same way: Once upon a time…" -Captain Britain, Excalibur #81
Once upon a time, in a moment of profound arrogance, I started something… something that was supposed to be sublime, something that had untapped potential… something called "OUTSIDE!". Instead of my intended purpose, I inadvertently created the foundation of a teetering shack filled abrim with chaos. Ultimately, I was wrong… I made a mistake.
A mistake. A simple, honest mistake, but a mistake nonetheless. Spawning "OUTSIDE!" was not my mistake and believing that a peaceful unification of our uncivilized species was possible was not my mistake. My mistake was preaching of a harmonious utopia among students to people who didn't want to listen. Everyone was willing to hear my side, but no one was prepared to actually listen. So, I compromised my principles and reached into my knowledge of propaganda. I know that people often unite when they are all oppressed be a common enemy, but who was our common enemy? Then, all it took was one teacher's ignorant statement to send me spiraling into an alternate dimension of hatred… all it took was one teacher who said, "You can have opinions but you can't voice them!" and all my past perceptions of reality and justice were forsaken for my new found bitter perceptions of life. What started out as a dream of a peaceful unification became a nightmare of hatred and mob mentality. Then again, how does the saying go? "No good deed shall ever go unpunished"?
And so I was punished to an unimaginable extent for an ideal… and event that snowballed out of anyone's control. I was expelled, I was failed out of two classes and when my name is brought up in a conversation its context would lead you to believe they were talking about the Anti-Christ infecting the minds of a Christian congregation. It was basically shock therapy… if you get beat down for having a dream enough times, your dreams will cease to exist. My dreams faded away into oblivion and I fell into what I was given in kind… nothing but anger and agony, bitterness and betrayal.
"OUTSIDE!" was then bequeathed to its zealots. All of the writers fell into this hatred and perceived it to be justice… to be the "right thing." After all, that was all that the system showed them. An eye for an eye. As time went on, "OUTSIDE!" 's acolytes continued to perverse my once proud dream. Every article was pure hatred on an unimaginable scale. At that point my bitterness magnified ten-fold and I began my self-imposed isolation. For the first time, everyone saw how dead I truly was inside.
Then, something… "weird" (to say the least) happened. I paused for a brief moment and let someone inside. What's so big about that? Well… I've never been good at letting others know me. When I meet people I have shields erected around me that Iron Man's armor would be envious of. I show people a cocky, sarcastic, shallow person with a smart mouth. It was so much easier that way. Granted, friends were few and far between… in fact, only one great friend, but that insured heart ache was minimal. So, you can imagine my astonishment when I showed someone the real me and she liked what she saw! I wore my heart on my sleeve… revealing emotions, an intellectual side I seldomly showed and the me that I always wanted to be but was afraid to. It finally occurred to me that it is possible to let others inside and not be hurt. That, despite all our inadequacies, we need not hide behind our rapier wit and run from our problems. I revealed myself everyday for three weeks. In that amount of time, I was changed in so many radical aspects, everyone of them better than before. I feel better, I can think better and I am a better person than before... I am now alive inside. All it took was three weeks to disenthrall the hatred I siphoned from the apathetic system ever since I moved here nine years ago. And even though I am alive and well, my dream is now… and I doubt it ever will be.
When you wipe everything away, mine is a dream to live in harmony with everyone… no matter what. No hatred, no violence and no lies of any sort. Hopefully, someday everyone will realize this is the only way we, as a species-- as a planet, can survive. This has become my clarion call of sorts… something I believe so deeply in I will seed any peaceful opportunity to insure it one day becomes a reality. However, in order for my dream to exist it is necessary for others to share it. A "Catch 22" of sorts.
No matter how hard I try, I will never see my dream of an avalon be accomplished in this institution. I now know that even though I will never stop trying to right any wrong that I can, I can't change the world. I also realize one other thing I can do to halt the hatred in our halls… I can eliminate "OUTSIDE!". There was never a choice. All I have succeeded in accomplishing is providing a forum for hatred. Ironic, is it not? With one event I did more to distance our school than anyone else before. All I did was create two new cliques… the "OUTSIDE!" 'ers and the "Anti-OUTSIDE!" 'ers. I can no longer continue to allow that.
Does this mean that "OUTSIDE!" is dead? There is one thing I know as a fact: dreams NEVER die. Hope can fade and faith can crumble, but nothing can kill a dream. After all, it wasn't my dream that let me down… it was reality. So, "OUTSIDE!" will live on, but not in a puny pamphlet of underground papers distributed to a select few. Now, "OUTSIDE!" is alive tot hose who are ready to hear it and dead to the pathetically sheltered community we live within. "OUTSIDE!" is a web page and new will relate common views around the globe. I was defeated here… I tried to fight the spiders in their parlor. Now, the "web" is my arena and they will not be successful in denying me my first amendment right this time… You can view previous and new articles of "OUTSIDE!" at this URL:
If you would like to contribute your thoughts on peaceful anarchy, the condition of man kind or anything that others would find thought prevoking, please e-mail the "OUTSIDE!" staff at:
fan_letters@hotmail.com
Recently, everyone from the press to grandparents have been asking me the same question: "Given everything that has happened, would you make the same decisions if you were given the opportunity to change the past?" Well, that's something that I've been thinking a lot about recently, and I always come to the same conclusion: Absolutely. Even though it has been hard on others around me, I honestly believe that everyone is coming away from these events with a better outlook on life than before… especially me. It is amazing to see the personal growth that others go through in such a short amount of time… and I know that I am a much better person that prior to making my mistake. No one is above making mistakes and I am not above asking for help in correcting mine. I hope this helped in correcting mine… all I ask now is that you assist me in correcting my mistakes, not condemn me for them.
