Kicking Things Off

Is there any justification to be ashamed of who you are? My brain tells me no, but its very difficult to believe that sometimes. Is there any justification to doubt the choices you once made with unmovable conviction? My brain tells me that it is always ok to have a little doubt; so why do I feel so horrible about doubting myself? Why do I feel like I am betraying little 4th grade me? Why do I feel like I am betraying my parents, my family, my friends? I am trying to be proud of who I am, trying to trust in the decisions I have made while at the same time lamenting the fact that I know I made wrong decisions and its too late to correct these. [The rest of this post is probably going to dissolve into a major vent, so you could probably get off just reading the first line of each paragraph or something]

I want to be proud that I am gay, I want to see it as a unique and interesting, but socially insignificant trait of character. Fuck you mom and dad, fuck you little brother, fuck you to almost all of my friends. I've been told that if I came out to all of these people, they would still love me and treat me with respect, and that I'm only hurting myself by keeping the secret. Honestly, as much as I would love to believe this, I have a damn hard time with it.
My parents are already distant, they don't know much that goes on in my life, and they are hopelessly naive in that they still believe everything is fine and dandy; they haven't noticed me struggling and they haven't noticed my little brother struggling (though to their credit, they have had their hands full worrying about my disabled older brother and the worsening conditions of my various grandparents). In addition, I know for a fact that my mom is a homophobe. My dad probably wouldnt care so much, but what shaky relationship strings I have still tied to my mom would definitely be strained.
My younger brother's favorite insult is "gay" or "queer". He's a typical teenage little brother, but I've always felt as though he should have been the one born first, if that makes sense. He's three years yonger than me, but he takes after my dad's side of the family, whereas I take after my mom's. He's broad-shouldered, naturally athletic, sharp, and tall. I'm thin in comparison, I don't have much muscle mass, and its only gonna be a few more months before little bro is taller than I am. He can easily push me around and I can't do much but throw a snide remark. Sometimes we get along really well, but mostly we are at eachother's throats. I simply can't believe that, were he to find out I'm gay, he wouldn't use it as a weapon against me.
My friends are probably the most forgiving of the lot, and I'm still terrified of telling the majority of them. I know most of them probably would continue to treat with respect, but I know at least a few that would definitely not want to hang around with me any more.

On a completely different note (wait for it!), my life outside of school consists almost entirely of music (and there's the pun). I love listening to music, playing music, absorbing music. If I could do nothing but music all day, I would. [I wish I could bleed music, that would make my various self-harming habits so much more enjoyable] I can't imagine giving up music. I don't think I could do it. And yet, my future-planning skills have failed miserably; I don't really see any way that I will be able to continue music during college, because, thanks to my parents, I have applied to only a few schools, and almost all of them are very prestigious schools that require exclusive focus on the major of choice. My parents think I'm going into biology or perhaps pre-med. Neither of those would allow me to continue my goals, which include playing mysic for at least an hour a day. I simply wouldnt have the down time to do that.
And I cannot believe how I got talked out of applying to a single music school. I'm not applying to any conservatory or school of music... I'm such a tool.

Oh and did I mention I'm going deaf? Slowly. My ears ring constantly. Don't worry, I don't listen to my ipod at 300000 decibels for 6 hours a day. I locked my ipod volume at 1/4 its full potential, and then make a point of never turning it up past half that again. My ears ring, and the ringing gets louder and louder every week, because I play the fiddle/violin, and the way a fiddle is played projects sound directly into the musician's left ear. My particular fiddle (a gorgeous Italian with a beautifully bright sound, built in 2001, for anybody that cares) projects sound particularly well, so 15 minutes of playing is plenty enough to make my ears ring. I mute the fiddle with a bandana shoved under the chinrest, but it doesn't work very well and when I'm performing with my band, I have to be amplified.
The benefit of ear ringing is nearly-perfect relative pitch, since my ears ring at discernible and fairly constant pitches.

Finally, I'm worried sick about a couple of my friends in particular. Just a few months ago I discovered that the most amazing person I know, a girl I have been friends with for a long time, is bulimic and severly depressed, occasionally suicidal, and just not in a good place.

Complain complain complain, there are people that have it much worse off. Like I think I mentioned, I want to talk to people who are in a similar situation or who can connect in some way to what I've been rambling about. If you feel like talking, contact me, either through a comment or through email [statetheradio@gmail.com]. If you don't have anything better to do, you can follow me and my good friend on our venting blog at http://statetheradio.wordpress.com/

Thanks for reading.