(And by f-word, I mean Flugelhorn. Duh.)
Okay, guys. I get that February sucks. I get that Winterlochen sucks your soul faster than a starving Dementor. But seriously, people, WHAT IS UP WITH ALL OF THIS [FLUGELHORN]ING DRAMA?!?!?
You know what? I remember last year, about mid-February, there was an "expulsion massacre." It sucked, but we bounced back. We pulled ourselves together, we rallied. This year we get an "expulsion massacre," and not two weeks later, what happens? Someone else is leaving! Neither of the "expulsion massacres" hit me that hard at the time (sorry, expel-ees), namely because usually I had no idea what was going down and I wasn't close to that many people. But that doesn't mean that I didn't see the effect on the school...and the people I was close to, who wound up losing significant numbers of best friends.
And this time it's someone I knew, someone I cared about, and it has a pretty damn wide ripple effect. This time, the expel-ee was not a best friend to me, but a best friend to quite a few really good people who will seriously miss this kid--and I can say from personal experience that this guy had some KICK-ASS TALENT. We will all miss him, some of us more than others, all of us for different reasons.
Added to that, there is some serious dramallama business going down on a smaller scale. I'm talking about that he-said-she-said bachelor-science (sorry, had to throw in the tribute to Mr. Nadji) that EVERY high school faces...but, somehow, at Interlochen everything is magnified, possibly because our school is so freakin' small. Interlochen: Population 500. So tiny that what one person does has an effect on at least twenty people, which in turn effects twenty more people...and so it goes, until the entire school has no freaking clue what is going on and everyone is saying, "When in the purple hell did THAT happen?"
I'm sorry for ranting at you guys, but I'm beyond eloquence tonight. I am, excuse my French, PISSED OFF.
It's not just the expulsion, or the teenage drama (although I could write a blog post each about both of those subjects). It's the cabin fever. It's The Shining set at a flipping boarding school. It's the feeling that you just want to get the heck out of here NOW and you don't care where you go. You're so damn frustrated you could cry. Running through your entire repertoire of profane words helps for a fleeting moment and then it's gone. Screaming, crying, praying, kicking furniture, throwing things, making people feel miserable (although to be fair, most of them already do), taking out your frustration on every human or inanimate object to come your way...it's just that time of year.
I don't know why or how this occurs. All I know is that February is not the root of the problem. It's February after two months of the insanity that is Winterlochen. After three months of snow, ice, and wind, you begin to freak out (unless you are inhuman, in which case I would have to question why in the heck you're at Interlochen in the first place. Get out. We don't need aliens here). After awhile you start to feel trapped. And then you do things that have varying levels of stupidity.
Last month me and some of my friends put a huge banner inscribed with "ART MOVED" across one of the welcome signs. We had fun "rebelling." Wearing sunglasses to community meetings, quoting intense poetry and plays in the hallways, sitting under the table at dinnertime. No one got hurt, no one got high, and no one got in trouble. We were united, close, untouchable. No one could hurt us.
And now we're confused, scattered, afraid. Rumors are flying. "Oh my God, they're going to drug-test us!" "Oh my God, they're going to search our rooms!" "Oh my God, they're going to expel us just for knowing [insert name of expel-ee here]!" "Oh my God, they're going to dorm/suspend/expel us for fake cigarettes/making out/using caffeine after 2 PM!" We are trying to pull ourselves together, to no avail.
Some of us are going nuts over our majors. We can't get jobs on each other's film sets because we aren't popular enough, or because we haven't been here long enough, or because we're under/upperclassmen, or WHATEVER the reason. We've only been in second semester for three weeks and it feels like forever. People are complaining because they can't get into publications or into shows or get first chair in orchestra. People are getting lazy in classes. You know senioritis is running rampant when JUNIORS ARE GETTING IT.
Last year, right after the first big expulsapalooza, my friend Andrew wrote "If the devil had a month, it would be February." At the time I agreed with him. This year I know better. I know that it's not February that's tearing us apart from the inside out. It's us. If we tell ourselves "This is hell," we will fall apart. BUT. If we tell ourselves, "We can do this," we can--hopefully--pull ourselves together enough to get through Winterlochen.
Please, guys, don't be stupid. February at Winterlochen is already worming its way in, making us fight each other, making us fight ourselves. Do not let it tear you apart. This is crazy, you guys...don't let it get crazier.
Help me end the drama. Or, if not, for the love of all that's holy TRY to stop it from spreading.
We can do this.
Right?
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