Another year. The last dying remnants of youth unceremoniously stripped from a wave of unsuspecting high school students. Disoriented and stumbling through the thicket of their own clouded and ambiguous fate, many blindly collide with an institution of higher learning, drink themselves into a stupor and join their fellows long abandoned to their dead end workforce existences. Its not so bad, living is easy with eyes closed and hands fast at work. The remaining years slip away as sand through a clenched fist. Conform to society and waste away your youth by plunging it into the corrosive pool of routine, but don't forget to ask why at every stop.

     -Anonymous

They wanted you to take off on the path they called their own

GO THIS WAY => MAKE NEXT WRONG TURN
One was curvy, one was strewn
so  you looked down both ways
and knew that you didn't want to choose. 

So you walked a while
but you didn't go anywhere
and felt like you've been stared at
by the past several years. 

 Frustration now, is what you know
and you devise a path..
..the way you want to go.
Its full of fun
laughter
things you want to do.
It scared you a bit, to take off by yourself
but you get a grip
and plan your trip.      

Packing List                                  Things you Want to Pack(but will find along the way)                       
Love for self                                 Friends                                 
Sexy Undies                                 Love
Hunger to discover                        Worn Shoes    
Courage                                       Family  
Cuddly Blankets                            Knowledge   
Confidence
Favorite Pen
Blank Pages

ONE WAY NO TURNING BACK
Along the way,
you run into a crossroads.
The road to get you back where you started
or you take the way you want to go.
This intersection though,
is full of captivating things.
Comfort, fear, friends, beer.
Its an easy decision,
if you know what's best for you..
But with a lack of vision,
you can never tell what's next for you.

 It's a good thing you kept going...
Look what's in store!

NEXT RIGHT TURN - COLLEGE (a.k.a. Best Years of Life)

if you stayed where you were,
you would've only gotten blue
and wished that you kept on,
focused, with something to do.


DON'T MAKE NEXT RIGHT TURN - IT TAKES FOREVER
Then there was always the long way around
it could've been interesting,
its lingering
and it can make you unsure
but when you get to where you've been heading
you will have realized you've learned
by taking your time
living your life
extending your journey
never confined.

Then there is just the perfect kind of pace
with some wrong and right turns...
That always end up lighting your face
eaither with humility or wonder
with love for this life, you ponder.

Then there are time when you get yourself in trouble
and you don't want to go on in fears of rebuttal.

1.
VIOLATION: Friendship/Stole Boyfriend
FINE: An entire school year of being called names like slut, whore, skank, hoe, etc.
OFFENSE: First
2.
VIOLATION: Speeding Through Life
FINE: Regret and Premature Aging.
OFFENSE: Undetermined, Life is over before you get another chance.
3.
VIOLATION: Manipulation of Authority
FINE: Getting what you want at the expense of humility
OFFENSE: First, Second, and Third.
And it turns out,
it's not the way you want to go
but it's just the way you're going..

And regardless of which way you go
you'll cross all of these paths,
see signs that make you laugh
and then some where they made you wish
that you could've turned back.

No matter what, there are lessons all along
wherever you go, or end up
you will always have yourself to show.
Mistakes you make, can go horribly right
but you'd never know
until you find sight...

LOVE => MAKE RI-- WRONG TURN

...for what you feel
you can't ignore what burns inside
listen to it, because it's everything that's real.

And as this venture continues, always keep in touch
with what is within you.
Because as you trail along this path
you will lose some and gain some
but what's inside you will always last.
     -Emily Bishop

Dear Sholanda,

       I just wanna tell you that your so GRIMEY. Now that I'm of age I can understand why you cut my hair, but you did me to DIRTY. I was only 14. You had me going up to Corcoran my first year lookin' to rouge. You think you might of helped me? BONG- all you did was make it worse and harder to walk through those doors everyday. And you know what I had to go through every time I turned a corner? I heard a giggle, people staring. It was the worst three months of my life. Hair to me makes a person if you got a good hair-do then you feel way better inside and out.

-Shaleigha Freeman