who i was in high school

I was the emo kid. Kurt Cobain and Sylvia Plath were my idols, I wrote depressing poetry and hated everything mainstream. I sucked at sports, was president of the creative writing club and secretary of the multimedia club.

High school was a suffocating experience for me. I was blessed with a small but tight knit group of friends but I hated my teachers, I found the work boring and uninspiring and I yearned to get out of it.

One of the most defining moments in high school was the morning that my principal announced that one of my girls from my year had died in a car accident on her way to school. This affected me in a big way and I just could not stop thinking - what would she have done if she knew if she was going to die that faithful morning? Would she have gone to school in the preceding months? Would she have tied up all loose ends in her life? What would she do different?

While I didn't know her personally, this event affected me deeply - carpe diem I said to myself. Over the years, I would try to remind myself of the carpe diem principal conscientiously.