Dear Diary

July 12 2024

Dear Diary,
      Just like the story description says,this isn't actually a novel. It truly is my diary. I want to talk to someone but I don't know how so I am going to post it all here for anyone who mistakenly opens this book. I'm not going to lie, I am kinda hoping this autobiography or whatever it can be classified as blows up because all my other novels haven't. I think the ideas for the other novels are great but I just can't put how great they are into words and so it feels lukewarm.(I am writing another one now, I hope it has promise)
      Let me give myself a little back story,shall I ?
     I'm 18 and I think I have depression; I'm not sure.
It all started in Jss1 or maybe that's just where I can pinpoint it to. I started Jss1 a term and two weeks late and I was standing in front of the class to get introduced and I thought,' I'm lower than these people' . You see my dad died when I was 4 and since then things have been hard for just my mum( and her brothers who always assist her,my dad side of the family are shit) and this school I was in wasn't a small school,people there had money. Now you are wondering why an average woman would send her kids to a school above what she can afford( I have two senior sisters and a younger brother) but that is because she wants the best for us. The second born of our family was already there on a scholarship ( our first born was attending lessons to get ready for JAMB) and so she just sent me there too.
And so there I was thinking,' I am not up to this people standards' and since then things just spiralled downwards. I started becoming more quiet. I was always quiet in front of elders but not my mates and then I started to compare myself with others and that have been the death of me. Everything I did since then seemed bad. I wasn't tall enough, I wasn't handsome enough, I wasn't anything enough and I carried it along with me.
      SS1 and things were shitter. The guys started becoming more muscular but I was one of the leaner kids,guys were getting into things like football and other manly  stuff but I had more fun reading novels and watching music and listening to songs but that isn't good enough for a guy bow isn't it?
I compared how I looked to other guys too. I am cute, I know that and people have told me so too but what is cute compared to handsome and hot. And so most times I find myself hating how I look. I am tall but sometimes I feel that I am not tall enough.
My classmates weren't bad just so you know. They always wanted me to talk more and be more lively. And let me tell you that there were a lot of things I wanted to say but could I? No. Because I was too scared. Being quiet helped me learn to read and understand people characters and now I believe that I can actually understand a person by just watching them for a few minutes but who cares? Watching others isn't living. It just means everyone else is living but you and you can't do anything but watch. I so I became even more quiet,had a frown on my face always and started slouching trying to cut myself off from the world. Whenever I went anywhere I found the farthest corner to stay in and I made sure I was at a window. My classmates started to joke that I was creating a prison for myself in class because I never left that spot unless it was necessary. Sometimes the old me came out and for a few minutes I would be so free with everyone and be me but then I always found myself returning back to that spot and everytime I returned I became more quiet and more alone. My classmates sometimes called me a quiet troublemaker from the times that the old me came out but the class always went on without me anyways because old me wasn't around enough. The only class I ever felt so comfortable in that old me was always around was in Food and Nutrition class. Maybe because it was held round a round table with few people in the food and nutrition lab which is actually a huge kitchen with kitchen appliances. Maybe that kitchen made me feel like I was at home.
Ss2 and I made a friend. A very close one, maybe a best friend even. I always speed walked home alone everyday  from school( I speed walk every where withy head down because I hate to meet people's eyes)and he ran after and joined me and no matter how many times I told him I like to walk home alone he didn't listen. He started walking home with me every day and we became close friends. He told me that he was tired of all the cliques in school and then he noticed me and thought that no body should be alone like that and then we realized we liked a lot of similar things. We both wanted to study the same course in uni and we even wanted to attend the same uni. Our favorite colour were the same and we liked similar music. He was still sporty and muscular like every other guy but for some reason he wanted to be friends with me. He was one of the people that always told me that I was one of the most good looking people around even though I hardly believe. And like every other thing in my life this friendship was hard as well. I was always scared that he would get tired of me and return to his cliques( three years later and I still am) and I always felt like I was too boring for him. When he got into our dream uni before me I thought he would never want to talk to me again forgetting that throughout Ss3 he was my light house. He guided me, made me talk more and more me more noticed. He always jokes that I wouldn't have been able to survive Ss3 without him and he doesn't even know that that is the truth. And so when he got into uni I hardly chatted with him. But one day all of a sudden he called even though he knows I hate calls and we spoke for so long and he reminded me that I would be his best man on his wedding day and I could have cried for joy.
     Fast forward to the present and I got to say that I haven't felt so down in my life. I graduated from secondary school two years ago and I thought I would enter uni immediatly. I had written JAMB that year and I thought I would get in but my score wasn't up to the mark for my desired course. I might still have gotten in but my mum told me not to apply because my score was too low. In truth it was because she didn't have enough money to send me to school at the moment if I got in. The next year 2023 I did write and I got the cut off mark. I applied and I got a really high score in that uni screening exercise (330/400) and I was elated. I was definitely getting in now.
     That year the first list came out but I didn't get in. I still believed though because I knew that they were alot of other lists. The next year 2024 came and my brother was writing his JAMB. I knew that I should have applied for JAMB again since the lists hadn't been released but I couldn't. I couldn't write with my brother. My spirit would break and I would hate myself more. And besides my score was perfect. So I didn't apply and I missed the deadline. My brother did amazingly and his core is even higher than mine and I know he would get admission this year because he has always been lucky. And me, I'm sure you can guess. I didn't get in. So I'm here again till next year. Do you know what is funny? Everyone considers me so intelligent. I always was amongst the top 5 in my classes since primary school and everyone thought that I would gained admission on my first try but the truth is I know did down that I am not that great. I'm not one of those scholars that remembers everything till the day they day. Nah. I'm a crammer. I have gotten through school by cramming. I'm not that smart or brilliant. I have just been blessed with the ability to look at a book before the exams and remember everything as it was then forget later on. I'm a crammer.( I still remember the law of diminishing returns though. Boyles and Charles law too. Avogrado law too). And now I feel like an imposter. And do you know the worst thing. I don't feel like I'm missing my opportunity to learn. Nah. You to me uni has always been a place to rediscover your self ,to become a better better and so I want to go their so bad so I finally be somebody or at least something.  But now I'm stuck here while my former classmates are moving forward in life.
   I'm also tired of staying here with my family. They love me but I think low-key they are starting to get tired of me still being home. Nowadays they remind me of how much I hate myself. They are tired but they feel that I am not as active as a boy and a first son should be. 'why don't you act like your mates. They are agile, active and you are here behaving like your jellyfish' ' why can't you talk out more?' ' why can't you be like Divine ?'. Last time one of my siblings called me useless and I think that something died in me. They don't understand that I would give anything to be like my mates or to at least be able to act like them but I know that I will never be able to pull it off. Anyone would be able to see that I am nothing like they are. I'm below them. So I fold even more into myself.
    My family also don't like the fact that I don't have a lot of friends and that I have a bad mouth. It's true. My words can be very mean sometimes. I never insult anyone except my family to their faces but sometimes I see all these people enjoying their lives on social media and then I say really mean things. I don't do this because it is fun. Yes maybe I have always enjoyed criticizing others since I was little but I think I insult others so much because I need to find things that show that I am not the only one with so many defaults.
     Did I tell you that I also teach. Yeah I am now a teacher until next year when I write JAMB again and I hate it. I don't really like babies or children( I have never liked a baby and most children annoy me) but this isn't really why I don't like teaching. I don't like teaching because everyday it reminds me that I am working because I haven't gotten into uni and I don't like teaching because I feel that I am not good enough to teach. Let me tell you that I try my best or at least what I think is my best but I always feel like I will come up short. And then I feel like I am destroying the lives of these children because basic education is the best right? Everyday the teachers tell me that I am one of the best and that I'm good but everytime I make a small mistake I feel like soon everyone will call me out as a imposter or that everyone is gossiping behind my back. It is really stressful.
   Anyway this is a little back story of my life. And since I can't find anyone to tell how I feel you are now my new therapist. Our schedule is everyday that I can. But I am tired of writing now so bye:)