Tuesday, August 11, 2009
The beginning of...what, exactly? I don't know. That's why I asked you. Well then, let's make some introductions, shall we?
My name is Rowan and I'm a recovering drug addict.
. . . . .
No, not really. Let's try this again.
My name is Rowan, and I'm a fifteen year old chica with mixed heritage (1/2 Irish, 1/4 French, 1/4 Native American, 100% clinically insane). I'm homeschooled and proud of it. I'm not your average I'm-homeschooled-therefore-I-grew-up-on-a-farm type of girl, nor am I your average I'm-homeschooled-and-I-rather-smell-like-old-cheese type of girl. Seriously. Some of them actually smell like old cheese. It's disgusting.
No, I'm not typically your average girl. Then again, who the hell is actually average? What is average anyway? Exactly. You don't know, I don't know, nobody knows. How can you measure average, when supposedly everyone's "unique"? Point in case.
Anyway, back from that little diversion...I was born just outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and we lived there until I was about three, and my little brother, Declan (who was born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania two years after me) was only a year old. He does all his crazy shizz here. Continuing with my little story...when I was about three, we moved to Ireland and resided there, in a tiny rent-a-house, for roughly five years while my father worked as a bar-tender, and my stay-at-home mom gave us the best she could. That was saying a lot at the time, because we weren't exactly living in riches. We traveled A LOT when we lived there. Just in those few years of staying, I'd gone to Wales, England, Finland, France, Greece, and even back to the States a few times. So in Ireland, I had lots of friends and I was probably one of the most pampered kids in our neighborhood and blah blah blah happily ever after, right?
Wrong.
When I was about eight or nine years old, we moved back to the States. I remember the weeks when we were packing up, because they were the weeks following September 11, 2001. I don't remember the attack very well, as we were in Ireland when it happened, but I do remeber how much I cried when we left. But that's beside the point. Point is, we moved back to the States.
The next few years were very...difficult on my whole family. My father got a job as a social worker in New Jersey, and my mom worked as one as well for a time. My brother and I stayed in my Grandmother's house in Philly, with her two-hundred-and-seven-thousand cats and her peanut-butter-and-Fluff sandwiches.
A couple months of that little...obstacle, and we moved into my great-grandmother's house in New Jersey. My brother and I went to a Catholic school there. It was a fairly good school. I'm guessing the people were okay, but obviously they weren't very prominent figures in my life, as I can't recall any of them.
When I was about eleven, my mom quit her job, my dad didn't, and my family migrated to a small, quiet area of Lancaster, PA. The education system was less than satisfactory (i.e.: if you didn't understand something, the teacher, seemingly being paid to do so, would reply, "I don't need to answer that; I already got my degree", and would point to that one sheet of paper on that wall that always made you want to throw food at it), and the people were simply a random jumble of ignorance and petty childishness. They were the kind of people who smelled vaguely of money and baby powder when they walked by, nose in the air.
I'm pretty sure that was when the problems arose. I became one pissed off kid, and I picked fights with a lot of people who made fun of me, or looked at me wrong, or simply rubbed me the wrong way. Unfortunately, I'm still living down my pathetic reputation as a badass Irish chic with anger management issues and who was usually carrying around abnormally large wooden objects with which to beat people. I'm not proud of it now. But I damn well used to be.
My mother decided to homeschool me a half a year through sixth grade, but my attitude didn't improve. Rather, I became more shallow, shy, and withdrawn. I spent most of my middle school years in lonely drudgery, and I was a big fan of wallowing in self-pity.
It was only last year, when we moved from the Lily White suburbs to the rather diverse and amazing city of Lancaster, that my attitude toward things began to change and I became the wonderful (*cough*) person that I am today. I am a proud, and rather outspoken, Wiccan, despite my mother's claims that I can't possibly know what I am, and I am an open-minded soul who generally wishes to argue. Note that I said "argue" and not "bicker". If you don't know the difference, I suggest you quickly find a dictionary and enlighten yourself. I'm a patriot of sorts, and consider myself a Republican, but I'm really on the side of whoever is AGAINST socialist reform, and on the SIDE OF whoever actually has America in mind rather than just their own personal gains. Besides politics, which I adore, I also love the colors purple and green, but that also varies every once in a while, usually with my mood. I'm a learning-freak, too, so watch out for my magical powers. I may actually teach you something new.
Furthermore, I would like to point out to everyone that I am a ninja, I can see in the dark with a nightlight on, and I am a huge fan of Colin Farrell.
My life hasn't exactly been an adventure so far, and I'm not exactly in the position to come into large sums of money that I can waste on recreation, so I guess I'll just have to wait and see where my imagination takes me!
~ r o w a n <3
