Life Beyond the Playground

A mere twenty four hours ago, my first term - six exhausting weeks of piercing looks, offensive comments and occasional piles of homework - was drawn to close. Gone. Finished. Done.

By the time that I shot out of the building to catch the bus home, my mind had been swept into a currant stronger than the sea: it was impossible to believe that, after spending nearly two months dreaming of the summer holidays to arrive, they had finally landed. And, to a certain extent, I've been walking around in a similar daze today, unable to collect my thoughts and re-arrange them into a neat and Mum-approved pile.

It's just... hmm. For perhaps once in my entire life, no words can disguise my feelings nor protect me like a sword defending a warrior. As a wannabe psychologist (one thing that I did think about before losing my mind was entering psychiatry if a career in journalism did not work out), I'm usually up-to-date with how I'm feeling, and like to believe that I know myself as well as Cheryl Cole's life story.

But right now, I just don't know what is going on with my mind because, to my lack of knowledge, I have put up barriers which are preventing myself from peeping inside. In simpler words (for my brain cannot process such demanding ones), I am the culprit who has created the oh-so-glorious mess which is my beloved, yet clouded mind. My thought machine. Partner in crime. Portable workbank. Oh, how I would love nothing more than to discover what is making it as cloudy as a plain British sky!

Before I get stuck in the task of freeing myself from, well, myself, let's take a step back in time - or at least the past few days - which might or might not give an indication to how I'm currently feeling. One moment, millions of butterflies were the sole root of pre-assessment nerves exactly one week ago, then I was jumping from place to place (as much as you possibly could whilst clad in skin-tight jeans) as the days got nearer to the summer holidays beginning their six week long reign. Never have the words roller coaster had a greater impact on me like ever before because, as the dictionary advises, my life has been riding at a high-speed pace 24/7.

From getting ready before heading out the door each morning to preparing for the new week ahead of me at the weekend, no escape has been granted from the one-and-only focus in my life: school. Whatever I read, study, think and talk about, school is almost always the main subject, regardless of whether I'm doing something completely unrelated to it. Discussions about latest world affairs quickly morph into rants about teacher strikes, whereas I cannot get enough of reading stories based in high schools, absorbing the words like a sponge.

Now that it has been laid out bare in front of the internet's watchful glare, there is a question that I must ask myself: am I obsessed with school? If other teenagers were asked such a thing, a muttered response of 'no' would be mumbled out of their lips, eager to not make the truth public - or at least Facebook - knowledge. But me? I run this blog for the sake of being honest about teenage life, and how oh-so-cruel it can be to puberty's unfortunate minions, such as my spot-suffering self. So, with the possibility of a lie-detector test being imposed if I refuse to answer, spilling the beans is a necessity.

Without needing to call a news conference and say it out loud in front of my favourite TV stations, you will hear the truth from the horse's mouth, or at least my Vaseline-coated lips. I am obsessed with school, and put my heart and soul into thinking about it whenever a chance to participate in my new-found activity is up for grabs. Forget baking a cake which would delight not only my family but my greedy-as-ever appetite. Pay no attention to my need to pluck a pair of eyebrows as overgrown as a rainforest. And there is certainly not enough time given to indulging on a beloved hobby - blogging. Life is usually about school, homework, friends/frenemies, weekly portions of half-soft chips and school yet again. And, as I catch my first glimpse of freedom, where does it leave me? Dazed and confused.

Yet, if I'd given myself more than five minutes to think about it, being caught in the grip of confusion isn't nearly as surprising as it seems. For one thing, I've been living in a permanent mindset for the purpose of going to school before I even started, back in the days of ringing up establishments all over the county. Like my previous life in a different part of the country, the world before starting secondary school is a distant memory, and only comes back to me in short bursts. Those memories are blurred in comparison to the fresh ones which flout around my mind in the present, despite some I would prefer to not remember. But it is those that I'm keen to cherish and preserve for as long as possible because, despite not being appreciated enough at the time, they mean more to me a few months on. They took place in a time which is worlds apart with my life of late, and don't stir any trouble within my blurred mind.

Needless to say, there are many things which I miss about my life before attending school became a major part of it. I miss not having to get out of bed to go to a place at which I'm trapped for over seven hours five days per week. I miss studying in silence and learning something at my own pace. I miss being at home. my ultimate safe haven. I miss my family and, of course, my cherished kittens who are now growing up without me by their side all the time - and they miss me.

The list of all the things that I miss could go on forever if I possessed the energy to jot every single thing down, but you get the picture. Time is a great healer, as I sometimes say, because it gives you more perspective as you get further away from events which come to define you. Though the months that passed after my cats' deaths last year somewhat eased my grief, the same magic - if you would ever consider calling it so - hasn't cast a soothing spell over my feelings at school. In fact, my first day and a half was the easiest time at my new school as I had not been awoke to the horrors which existed within the premises - and beyond the corridors, as I would later find out.

Granted with the benefit of time, pupils have shown their true colours and given me an insight into not only what they are like, but also the school itself. And, unknown to my family and I when we were taken on a tour around it a few weeks before I started, there were many things which were casually swept underneath the carpet that, as soon as I signed the application form, came into existence from the moment I became the school's newest pupil. With little or no knowledge of secondary schools to hand, how was I supposed to anticipate the questions - most of which either offended or irritated me beyond belief - that would be tossed at me once I entered the playground? In that sense, I feel cheated after being attracted by a beautiful picture which the school painted specially for my eyes: after over six weeks of experience under my belt, I realized ages ago that such perfection does not exist.

Perfection is an image conjured by wishes we want to come true, despite the odds being highly unlikely in our favour. I feel like a fool for getting caught up in the moment and expecting the very best from my school because, no matter how hard anybody tries, it lacked a proper chance of being achieved. Unless the pupils suddenly stopped getting on my nerves and lockers - the ultimate reprieve from constant carrying of my (heavy) backpack and P.E. kit - being installed across campus, the school would have faced an all-mighty challenge to live up to the dream whose existence remained in my imagination. So, having to acknowledge and accept that life itself isn't bursting with dreamlike perfection has knocked me for six, and is a lesson which I'm still on the path to understanding.

Therefore, the summer holidays won't be a complete escape from The Land of Learning as lessons about life will continue to be taught long after the final bell has been rung throughout school. But as my former status as a home-schooler included lessons left untaught on the National Curriculum - e.g. developing common sense a rarity in this modern age - I'm used to looking beyond the surface, and it is a tool which will hopefully become my advantage in the future.

Many paragraphs later, a question - though unasked until now has a right to be plucked into the air - deserves to be asked by none other than my inquisitive self: how do I feel now? Has the fog cleared the misty remains of my mind, or is my head as blurred as the lines whose crudeness Robin Thicke was unable to comprehend?

There are no right or wrong answers, so I'm going to say that, thanks to a spell in blogging therapy, my recovery from end-of-school fever has begun. Realizing that attending school is no longer compulsory until the new year begins in September is yet another shock to the system, especially as I have only just gotten used to going there! And, as a heatwave rages on across the country, sleep is as prized as the latest iPhone; you know that you have been blessed if restlessness doesn't affect you in any way whatsoever. My eyes droop as I struggle to stay focused while writing this, and I dread getting out of bed each morning - despite lie-ins being re-introduced into my routine!

Change is hard and, despite getting to grips with it in the past year alone, I'm not immune to the strains that it sometimes brings. Humanity accepts moments of weakness and, if my mind isn't as bright as it usually is, so be it. Like a phoenix from the ashes, I'll rise*. Well, it was a poem that I was taught at school this summer. My mind can't be too bad if I can recall its most famous line, can it?

*Still I Rise by Maya Angelou