I've always considered myself as a somewhat philosophical person, even if I did dismally in philosophy at school.

The main reason for this is that my opinions and beliefs are somewhat unorthodox and controversial. This is a product of a rather unusual childhood: my medical condition, the difficulties of being the product of two cultures placed into another, radically different one, my unusual talents and my abnormal shortcomings, and something else...put it this way: I've never been officially diagnosed with a mental illness, but for some time now I've come to terms with the fact that I am not quite right in the head.

I've always prided myself in my ability to defy convention, defy Fate and God, if either exist, and take my life into my own hands. When one is a legal child such opportunities are few and far between, and often discouraged, but I jump at every chance to be different, a better person.  In fact, my proudest achievement is my sound manipulation of the education system. Like Frankie said, I did it my way.

But my operations, which are few and far between yet still quite monumental and numerous for someone of my age, I feel as if we are defying both Fate and my innate desire to be in control of my personal affairs. For the most part, my operations are life-saving and I would almost certainly be dead if I did not go through with them, but there is something unethical about it - I always feel wrong as I go through with it, as if someone somewhere had intended for something to happen, or for things not to happen, but we defy them without fully knowing the consequences. A first thing that I have always found grating is that my parents and my doctors often speak of my operations as if I am not there, and until very recently I had no say as to what ungodly procedures they did to my body which I should rightfully claim as my own. In my latest operation I put my foot down at the doctor's suggestion of a rather major and risky operation in favour of a smaller, less invasive one. In an attempt to sate my rebellious teenage attitude at the prospect of being unwillingly cut into pieces, the surgeon invited me to sign my consent, but it was an empty gesture - there was no official reason for me to sign, and therefore there was no designated place on the form for me to sign, and in any case, even if I refused to sign it, what happened wouldn't have been much different. It is during these dreaded times of hospital stays, endless amounts of painkillers and anaesthesia I feel the most vulnerable, and the most robbed of my rights. What kind of fourteen year old would contemplate an ethical death over a legally-valid life? I would. I may not believe in God, but I do have a sense of right and wrong, even if it is slightly warped. 

There is no prospect of me refusing an operation (with legal consequences) until I am at least eighteen, and in any case, I would break my mother's heart if I refused any, even if she were one hundred years old and approaching death and I were seventy and not far from joining her. But perhaps this right I hope I will eventually have, to deny myself the unnatural preservation of my life, I can use later as a form of voluntary suicide, when I am old and sick and weary of life. It is a small comfort, but a comfort nonetheless. But I often feel as though I am living out of borrowed time, time that is not mine - as if I was born intended for the grave but I cheated Death before I even knew I was doing so. I also feel resentful that I was not born with the unconditional right to life as others are.

There are very few things in this world that I am certain of. I try and avoid complacency at all costs, and one valuable thing I learned in philosophy (which goes completely against mathematical reasoning, which I love) is that even though the sun rose today and yesterday and every other day, it may not rise tomorrow. My lack of understanding of the most basic scientific phenomenon has undermined my ability to trust fully in them. In fact, perhaps the only thing that I have believed in all my life is my mother's unconditional and uncompromising love for me. I was a difficult child and I am an equally disagreeable teenager, and my strong and uncompromising character has brushed people up the wrong way, and people often do not comprehend what I am, and many do not even bother to, even those who are closest to me - my mother, in all her sweetness and her ability to accept difficult characters such as I her daughter, seems mostly above this, which is why she is my only and dearest friend, although even she does not fully understand who I am and how things affect me. All other institutions of love or intimacy or friendship have broken time and time again, due to flimsy allegiances and phony charades of comraderie, but this one thing is the only unbreakable thing in my life. Perhaps I will go mad without it.

Am I mad? I think so. My inability to respond appropriately to acts of kindness and gratitude, my suspicion and contempt of most forms of amicability or friendship (although this is heavily influenced by some personal experiences) and my strong love of solititude confirms in the very least I am not your average fifteen year old. I am amazingly contradictory: I want to be different, but I want to be loved for it. I often cry out of loneliness, but for some reason I cannot summon the effort or will to maintain friendships. Other percieved abnormalities and shortcomings of my character I think are simply the limitations of culture: people, mostly white people, often criticize my apparent lack of humility, but I think that is a bit of a one-dimensional reading of my character. I lack the ability to pretend that I am average and mediocre in all things, and I would have thought it quite natural to be proud of my achievements and ashamed of my faults, but apparently it isn't acceptable. Such is the profound effect of this social double standard that for quite some time now I have battled some unforgiving and often underestimated bouts of depression. My distinct knowledge of my impressive strengths and my dismal failures has been enormously helpful in my often risky decisions regarding my eduation and other aspects of my life, but it has cost me almost everything: friends, a place in society, and the ever-elusive goal of love.

My preoccupation with love, I think, transcends average teenage infatuations. I love sometimes for no reason, or for the most trivial of reasons, and my love is almost always both unconditional and largely unreciprocated. It's a foolish pastime, love, especially in high school, but it's some kind of addiction - and as always, when one wakes up, it's a heartbreaking experience. In regards to the dismal business that is K, I think now, reflecting on it, the hardest part was not my obvious foolishness nor his apparent betrayal or my feeling of wretched worthlessness, but the fact that sometimes I could not extract any feeling or emotion from him. It frustrated me to no end - because the whole business sapped the life and strength out of me, and to him it seemed to be something of no consequence. So in truth, that was the largest cause of my pain. Had he hated me as passionately as I loved him, I would be emotionally satisfied. But when one has such strong emotions and receives little of that in return, you seem out of balance, and you get criticized for it. Really, it seems you get criticized for everything.

I've come to terms with most of what I am. I've learned to live with it, and manipulated it to my advantage. I've learned to love what I am. But the problem is...have you?