our town

5/10/01
     Yup, I live in a strange place. Suburbia - lots of chain restaurants and superstores, with hicks in. Time spent in my front yard is measured in how many whistles I get from guys in trucks driving down the road. Wal-mart is crowded even at 10:00 PM on Saturday night. New shopping centers are going up in every available square inch, and T.G.I. Friday's is always busy.
     This the land of stereotypically apathetic highschoolers who fight over nothing much, pulling hair and throwing punches. And this is the land of teachers who don't know their subjects, and bad reputations, and 'college-level' courses. This is also the land of shoplifting and 'good kids' who do bad things.
     God bless America.
     This is not my home. I've lived here fifteen and a half years, but it's not home. This house is home, maybe, and perhaps this road, but my hometown is gone. It was a little town with one grocery store and good restaurants and hobby shops, where it was all right for little kids to toddle around in diapers outside, and where all teenagers had to do for fun was beat in a few mailboxes. Home.
     I leave for a year and I come back to this. New overpasses, new 'scenic routes,' new nature trails. The 'best high school in the county' that offers PIN numbers for students who purchase school lunch, but can't even hire a French-speaking French teacher. This is the land of new and improved.
     You'll pardon me for being a little bit angsty. This has been building up in me all year, and I guess it's about the right time of the month to let it all out. Haha.
     I don't like this place. I've got no choice. I've got two years left to serve, and you can be sure I'm gonna overachieve as hard as I can so the first chance I get, I'm out. Out to California, or France, or someplace unlike this one. I love you guys, but I can't handle this state. The girls in my AP class who aspire to being rich housewives are just not my kind of people, and they're the future of this town. Screw the future. Let's rewind.