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you know what bugs me?
how everyone lives in their own little world.
and i mean everyone, preps, jocks, emos, skaters, stoners, everyone.
"oh, everyone hates me," "oh, i have to look pretty," "oh, im all alone" "oh, if i dont go to that party my life is over!"
etc.

wake up people, ok, maybe it will be sad if you cant go to Joe's house today, maybe it is sad that you dont have anyone you consider real friends, maybe it is sad you parents seem to love you sister more than you, maybe it is sad your mom wont let you go to Cancun this summer.

well, there are a lot of things that are worse.

and im not complaining about people who suffer from depression, that is completely unavoidable, that is just how your brain was wired, that isnt anyone's fault. i know people who have depression, and if they are... well, depressed no matter how good their life is. But it is the people with no reason to be miserable that bug me.

there is this woman if Africa RIGHT NOW. i cant remember her name, but she has two little kids. She has virtually no money, and has to work as a prostitute to feed her children. Her husband was abusive, so she left him a few years ago. But she couldn't get any other job apart from being a prostitute.

there was this baby, just a tiny kid, no older than two. His dad was watching him for the day, and when his dad went to work, he left the kid in his car. It was summer, and the windows were rolled up. Dad forgot about the kid. When he came back several hours later, baby was bloated and dead.

there was this girl, only a few months ago. She was kidnapped about 5 feet from her front door after she arrived home from school. she was taken to the forest by her kidnapper and led into an underground bunker, with enough supplies to last several months. She was kept there for weeks, while her captor raped her at least three times a day, until by some miracle she managed to escape.

there were the 20 women who were kidnapped, raped, and murdered b y Ted Bundy, and the 20 or so women who were kidnapped, rpaed, and killed by the Green River killer.

There was the Boy Scout who was mauled and killed by a bear on a camping trip, and the other boy scout who fell off a cliff during a hike.

There are the Katrina Victims, the tsunami victims, the earthquake victims.

There is Stephen Hawking. If you dont know who he is, look him up. He is rich, and a genius. He has a wife and kids. And he is completely Paralyzed forever and doomed to die from it.

There is my aunts cat, who was poisoned by a neighbor. There are all the animals is the pound who are put to sleep everyday because people who rather not spay and neuer there own cats and let them get pregnant.

Have how ever heard of the Hannah Rose Program? It's a Don't Shake Your Baby program, because little Hannah was shaken to death before her 2nd birthday.

My Grandma had cancer. She was diagnosed when she was in her early 40's. My mom, the youngest in the family, was just a little girl. My Grandma had so many different types of cancer, it was ridiculous. She suffered for over 20 more years. Towards the end, she was in constant pain. She had to wear adult diapers. She couldn't take bath because she was afraid of falling. She couldn't stand up, and didn't always remember who we were. She couldn't even eat. I remember once she was laying on the couch, completely miserable. She said, "I want my mother."
that broke my heart. She felt alone. She wanted to be put down, like a cat or dog, but the doctors wouldn't let her. She died one morning. I was sleeping in the room across from hers.

My father was hit by a car twice, slipped on black ice and broke his collar bone, his appendix exploded, and just generally got hurt a lot.

My mother fell out of a speeding car, skidding on her face across the side walk. She rode her bike as fast as she could trying to catch up with her sister down a hill and rode into a car, hurting her jaw so bad she couldn't open it for 4 hours after wards. She also had her arm bitten clean though by her pet Scarlet Macaw, the only bird with enough strength to crack a brazil nut, the hardest nut. She also stepped on broken glass once and got a huge piece stuck in her foot. My grandpa, instead of taking her to the doctors, heated up his knife and cut it out in the living room.

I have a close friend whose life i dont feel comfortable talking about here, but it was god awful. She was abused, abandoned, and confused. She is one of the happiest, friendliest people I know. Correction, she IS the happiest, friendliest person I know.

I myself almost drowned once. i was in the wave pool at a water park, and got caught under. There were too many peopel, and the waves kept pushing me under. I was right next to a life guard, but he didn't notice me. I couldn't even really swim, i was separated from my friends and looking for them. someone told me they were in the wave pool. That someone, who was an adult and the mother of my best friend, didn't notice i disappeared under the water either. I fought so hard, but i could get out. I was so tired, i just felt like giving up. It was preferable to any more fighting. Then I managed to grab a half deflated inner tube. A teenage girl saw my hand and pulled me out. if either the innertube or the girl hadn't happened to be in the right place at the right time, i would have given up and let myself drown.
I was about 9.

so grow up. Yeah, your life might be sad, but a whole hell of a lot of people have worse lives than you. Admittedly, the worst you have ever know is the worst you have ever known, and no matter what happens to anyone else doesn't make it any less painful. But when you are about to cut your wrists of shoot up your school or spread a nasty rumor, take a minute and remember Hannah Rose, or look up pictures of Darfur. Learn about a girl that was brutally murdered. Imagine who she was before she died, what she was thinking before she was killed, the terror, the hopelessness she felt. Just remember, its ok to be upset about something that happened to you, it is ok to hate some people, but also remember it could be so much worse. When the girl over there steals your best friend, remember how you DIDN'T donate any money to the cancer victims this year. Who has it worse?