CBHS Valedictory Article - 18 Oct '14

The following moving essay is by CBHS matric student, Michaela Atherton. You can download it as a PDF file ‹‹here››. For the article on the CBHS Valedictory Assembly, click ‹‹here››

Who We Are

I'm tired of running, I'm tired of feeling, I'm tired of breathing because I'm exhausted, My heart doesn't know how to beat, my brain doesn't know what to think and its sad because I'm only 18. We're young wild and free because YOLO, you only live once and you only love once and everybody can see that that it’s just an excuse to make bad decisions and assume that we'll be forgiven but we all use it, the most common excuse in the book: "But we're the human race" We make mistakes, we lie, we cheat, we steal, we invent, we destroy, we try, we fail, we fight, we kill, we're stupidly sophisticated in the most intoxicated way and everyone is exactly the same. We are human.

We lie to make that truth a reality because anything is better than facing it because the cold hard truth results in frost bite and can freeze your whole world and crush it into tiny, microscopic pieces that we call diamonds.

The only escape from this human infection is a simple blade to the throat, the decision to sink and not float, to fall and not soar to run and hide because the all seeing eyes of this so called god has you on his radar.

We spend our whole lives trying to find love, light, passion and intensity, we fight for these so called rights that enable us to speak our minds but are trapped behind the bars of fear to truly preach the truth because when it comes out the moment of intensity is like a punch in the face and you can say is: "I'm sorry", "I'm sorry for being born, for breathing, for crying, for feeling, for chasing this unrealistic perception of the "perfect relationship", the "perfect friend group." And the "ideal life" but screwing it up the minute I hold it in my hands like a new born child.

And so for that I am sorry for, running, for jumping, for over eating, for starving myself, for twisting my emotions into knots that are tied to keep my body in one piece, for making myself vomit out the pain because I can’t keep it in anymore.

I'm sorry for not having a plan, for not taking a stand, for being a follower and not a leader for being a directioner and not a belieber, for being consumed by flashing images on my television screen for following voices that boom out of the radio stream. For not being fast enough, for not soaring high enough, for not being smart enough, for not being pretty enough, for not being skinny enough for never being tall enough to measure up to the unrealistic standards of this twisted society.  I am sorry for being me.

But now I will stop apologizing because I'm wasting my breath, I'm going to, instead, say that I will start hoping, because that's something we lost in the dark when we turned off our humanity.
I have hope that I will learn, I will soar and will be forgiven. That I will swim and not sink to the bottom of the emptiness we call doubt,  that I will not label every mistake I will ever make with the excuse with "I'm only human."

I need to realize when I'm wrong, when I've screwed up, when I've hurt somebody else and know when enough is enough. I am hopeful that we will appreciate everyday just as I did every rose you gave me, that we will get lost in fields of sunflowers just as we have in our insanity.

I am hopeful that we will not lie, cheat or steal because nobody should be labeled as slut, whore, home wrecker, player, friend hater, trouble maker, game changer and heart taker.

We must realize that we are not merely human, we are extraordinary, we are beautiful, we're allowed to be wrong when being right isn't an option, we're allowed to be hopeful, to be doubtful and to want to start again when its game over.

We need to accept that everything we have, everyone we meet and everything we do shape’s our lives and creates a figure we call "the future." Put that figure up in the galleries, make it into a boat and set sail across the vast ocean of opportunity. Love everything, no matter how hard, feel every moment as it comes and learn, not like you would from a textbook but from your footsteps, make sure the trail you make and the steps you take are worth taking.

Speak when words are needed and learn to appreciate the silence when words are not required and accept that we are the human race yeah we make mistakes but it really isn't a race at all, nobody should count down the days, until this beautiful life is over. We are fragile but we are also insanely strong, we have no freaking idea where we belong but I ask you to stop and to learn to gaze at the stars because at the end of the day, that's just who we are.


Michaela Atherton