Call Me Weird Once, Call Me Wacko Twice

I feel . . . unsteady. It's like I can't really control my emotions anymore. I don't even know if this is normal. Is this what females are supposed to experience from time to time? These "emotions like rollercoasters". It's not hard for me to imagine that there's something off with me, this isn't the first time I've questioned my sanity. Lately, I feel like everytime I smile or laugh that I could cry. People may laugh so hard until they have tears in their eyes, but is it normal if you start to chuckle and you already feel tears welling up. As though there were something sorrowful about the topic you were talking about, but you felt like you had to laugh it off. I guess that could be the case, but I don't know what I'm sad about. I see my friends rather often, my family members are in good health, and I don't feel particularly lonely or depressed. I'm starting to think that the answers may lie with school. All this test preping for the SATs is just so stressing. What if I don't get high marks, or get the score I need? Studying mathematical formulas, vocabulary words, writing techniques, I just- Feel overwhelmed, I suppose? If I think about it, if this is the reason for my uneasiness, it's rather dumb. How many people, over the years have studied, studied, studied, and crammed for the SATs? But, as I look at the stack of SAT and AP books (passed onto me from Tanya, a beloved family friend who has finished with high school and is off to MIT on the East coast to persue her dreams in becoming an engineer) and my heart aches. Call me childish, but I don't want to grow up. I have high hopes for my future and I dream about it all the time, until I realize I do nothing for them. I try studying but my mind wanders and I feel dazed. I try to focus in school, but my head turns away. I do nothing for my grades when I tell myself if I keep trying harder, I'll do better, but my heart turns aganist me. I don't even pursue my own dream by writing. It's always just an opened document left untouched. I can't even follow my sister's footsteps, ones that I've avoided so much in detest. I can't even follow Tanya, who, in the end, wound up behind my sister. I feel like I'm running in cross country; everyone passes right past me, getting perfect grades and getting accepted to great schools, but I just hang my head in shame because I know. I know it's my fault for being in the back. I'm always dreaming, planning, and doing nothing. I ran away from becoming an engineer like my dad and my sister, because I knew I wouldn't work as hard as they did. What they lacked, they worked on. What I lack, I cry over. I chose to follow my hobby, writing. In the end, even if I do enjoy it more than math and science, I do nothing. And it's always someone else getting the gold medal, and it's always going to be my sister in my eyes.