There's this really amazing author named John Green.
John is kind of one of those everyday, inspirational people. He could really be anyone, and is in fact an average husband, brother, son, and father. He trolls the internet looking for LOL's and spends his days video blogging with his brother.
Together, the two of them have created a save haven of sorts on the internet for kids, from 8 to 80 to enjoy and embrace their nerdiness. Their videos have taught many life lessons, as they examine what it's like to grow up and live in today's society when you don't care only about the latest celebrity gossip. They're two average people, but together they've basically changed a big part of the weird.
John is a best-selling author of half a dozen books. While he writes for the so-called "young adult" crowd, he writes some of the most inspirational words I think I've ever read. In his latest novel, called The Fault in Our Stars, he crafts a story around two almost adults who both have terminal cancer. The characters are very at ease with their condition, have come to accept it as a part of who they are, and refuse to stop living despite the very disease which threatens to end them.
At one point in the novel, one of the main characters, Augustus Waters, tells the girl, Hazel that he is "on a roller coaster that only goes up".
Inspirational.
And I can't help but think that this is the way I want to live my life. There's been a lot of shit going on in my life in the last year, as you're well aware of my dear readers. My own battle with my father's cancer and his untimely death, being forced to move 400 miles away from home to a place where I knew practically no one, the trials and tribulations of trying to make friends (let alone the RIGHT KIND of friends), and the constant struggle with school.
My life has been one challenge after another since August 9th, 2011. But there hasn't been a single day that goes by and I don't marvel at how far me and my entire family have come.
It still amazes me that it's almost been a year now, when it used to be that each passing day and week was a huge challenge.
But at the same time, I'm not happy with the way I've been living my life.
When I moved to California, I had no idea who I wanted to be. I'd just come out of years of depression just months before and hadn't been able to be myself in my first college.... I was in the process of rediscovering exactly who I was, to try and get back to the Chelsea that existed in high school, my crazy, zany self.
I didn't accept a lot about myself: For years I'd been tormented by others about my Disney obsession and my nerdiness. In my old hometown, it wasn't acceptable. Disney was for children. To be a nerd was to be a social outcast. Not to mention I didn't believe in anything, so strange from my highly religious town.
I was different and I didn't accept that.
Since moving to California, however, I've managed to not only accept it but embrace it. I found a group of friends who understands my obsessions, who I can feel at ease with, and who will always be at my side no matter what.
But when summer started, I went back to work, and they went home, things started changing. I started getting confused about who I was again.
There are times that I worry that I'm not a whole person. That maybe I have some sort of social disorder or something and that it's apparent to everyone but myself. Because social situations aren't exactly my strongest point. I can't make conversation, I can't deal with large amounts of people and feel like if I only know one person, I have to hang onto them. It sucks major time. Words can't express how much I fret about that. Or that maybe I too have cancer, but I'm too stubborn and scared to look into it.
So while trying to rerediscover myself (and obviously find people I was comfortable being the real me with) I made some social mistakes along the way. My social anxiety has caused me to lie about a few details in my life without thinking, maybe to make myself seem cooler or fit in or to see what people will say. It's that social outcast I was in my hometown coming out again, thinking that I'll never be a "cool" kid no matter how hard I try. Like I even care anymore.
To top it all off, I found out that I will not be going to Scotland in the Spring which just plain sucks.
Yet somehow I'm getting through it.
This most recent news however, has had me making weird changes in my life. Scotland was my last "out" that I was supposed to have before starting quote-on-quote "real life". But now that I'm not going, I've started thinking about the future.
In my hometown I never made real connections because I was too concerned about getting out and moving on with my life. I started doing that here, missing out on things because I would be getting out.
But now I'm staying.
I'm staying at Disney. Eventually I'll move up from working rides to being the person that designs them. I want an actual career here. And I'm going to have to stay in California in order to fulfill that dream.
Which means I can start settling.
It's a weird feeling, knowing that you're not gonna move away from a place for a long time. To not be afraid of making connections because you won't have to say good bye in a few months or years. I can start an actual life here.
And that's just weird.
I've never been able to do that before. It's just kind of happening now and it's a strange feeling. I'm not really too sure how i feel about it either.
But I'm learning, slowly but surely, that I have to make due with what I have. There are some things in life that I have control over, that I'm able to change and bend to my will.
But sometimes Fate has a different view on things and will have her way.
I'm accepting that. And I want to make a better life for myself. I want to be able to be happy no matter what obstacles are thrown my life. I'm going to take advantage of every opportunity and start living in the day and not in the foresight.
I'm on a roller coaster that only goes up.
