Confessions of a Shaman 3

 School had started around the time that I was living with Tyler. I was determined to make my sophomore year better than my freshman year, and in many ways I succeeded. I was not at all social, but I was happy then. I had a better time with the whole idea of being different and around other people. Everyone was living in this confined space and they tried to blend in with people they felt most comfortable with. I made many people uncomfortable, especially after I got careless.

I left a book of mine out on the table in the cafeteria while I was getting my breakfast one morning and a friend of mine saw the book. She told all of her friends and those friends told other people. Suddenly the whole school knew about it and by the end of the day I was being taunted and teased for this ridiculous thing I was doing.

Once a kid in my English class Googled Wicca and Witchcraft on the IMac and started to read the page out loud and questioning me about certain aspects. Other kids were respectful but curious. Eventually the youth minister to the church I had once been attending heard about my craft and he told them all I was lost utterly in darkness, that it would be hard to draw me back into the fold. So then there began a group that would preach at me at intervals during the school year.

One day out of spite, I decided to do something slightly foolish. It was the only day of the school year you could wear a hat and everyone was wearing goofy hats for the day. I wore a black pointed witch’s hat, and grinned at the gawking looks on some of the people who condemned me for what they believed I was doing. From then on most of the students gave me a wide space, avoiding me at all costs. I was the “Satanist”. On occasion someone who maybe didn’t fit in to what everyone else was thinking they should be came to me for advice, and I gave it promptly and sincerely, not caring what they thought of me.

The more liberal teachers all loved me, praising me for my individuality and thirst for knowledge. I was an excellent student, despite hanging out with the few friends I had at the time and doing questionable things. I do not wish to incriminate anyone so I will try to avoid that topic. Teachers however, only saw what I was in the classroom. I kept so much to myself to many of them I was a totally different person.   

I saw school as a requirement to something better, a doorway to a life somewhere else, away from each and every one of these people, somewhere where nobody knew me and nobody cared. Obviously that is not what it was. It was a lot like being in a coma or having a full spectrum hallucination for eight hours a day, absorbing information and avoiding the unpleasant. Then when you got out, the real day started- away from the dull fluorescent darkness of the school. You could be as lazy or productive as you wanted and no one was telling you what to do; at least for me, since most didn’t often know what I was doing.

When I moved back to my grandmothers I was in the middle of sophomore year and stuff was going downhill fast.