I think the hardest part was that you made me believe I wasn't a good person anymore. You MADE me into someone who wasn't a good person anymore. And I have never actually stopped to think about whether YOU were a good person or not. I always brushed aside your actions for anger issues or trouble from the past. But you just...you never tried to ever fix that or better yourself. I'm seeing that now. You truly aren't a good person. You see the things you're doing wrong but instead of fixing them, you ignore them for a while, cover up, lie about it, then explode and make yourself out to be the victim and everyone else around you is guilty. Which is such a bullshit way of living. Because you wrong others, smash everything in your path, act like a douchebag, lash out, scream yell fight destroy, say whatever makes YOU feel good in the moment. You don't ever try to fix anything, you bottle it up and then get angry at the world. The world did you wrong, the world should have seen it. So people get double hurt, not only for trying to help you while you're supposedly "fixing" yourself (lying about it) but then when you decide you're sick of lying and then lash out. And everyone else is at wrong for not dealing with it. Everyone else is awful, everyone else has wronged you, everyone else is a bad person. 

Stop acting like a victim, stop saying you just want to be a good person, stop saying how you're so messed up and you're trying and all this bullshit. I always thought you were a good person, just given too much bad in the past. But I'm seeing now that you never changed and you aren't someone good. And I don't think you ever will be. 

Caring for someone like you is trying to pick up broken glass. I'm the only one that gets hurt. Truly hurt, not your version of victim hurt. Because I believe in you too much, because I give you too much credit, because I think for once you'll actually care enough to hold yourself back or care enough to make an effort to be better. But you're just full of lies and deception and hurtful words and just something really bad and poisonous. You always regret the things you've said and done to me but you were not the one being hit by those things. 

Before you, I never used to cry. Before you, I was relatively happy with myself, with my life. 

The week after we starte going out, I called my best friend crying, already hurt. 

Now I don't even have her. Now I don't even recognize who I am. Now I don't remember the last time I've gone through an entire day feeling okay. 

I'm looking forward to after you. But what's left after you?

You've made me lose everything. I don't want you or any of this anymore. I don't want my own life and it's all your damn fault. Actually, a lot of it is my own damn fault for letting you. I hate myself for it, absolutely, from the bottom of my heart. There's nothing but resentment left.

           

What do you do when everyday you feel like you're being suffocated? Like you can't breathe or move or do anything anymore? I have lost control of everything and there is a huge hole in my chest that makes it impossible for me to go on living like nothing is wrong

It is a terrifying feeling to know that the people who you would always still give up your life for, you've made feel like they don't matter whatsoever. It's a terrifying feeling knowing they've moved on without you and you are what you once were. My sisters consider me a stranger...and it's all my fault.

That's what breaks my heart.

Ramblings

I am and always have been self-conscious enough to feel silly about writing about my experiences...however, I feel that college and life and these past couple of months have warranted a need for me to express my thoughts outside of whatever little verbal communication I may have.

I vehemently denied the ending of high school for the last few weeks. I did not do all the things I should have. I did not hang out with the people I wanted to. I did not say the things I needed to. I let it pass by. The end of my childhood, I let it pass by and slip away and I did not even try to express how much it killed me to do so without an inidication of how much it truly meant to me. How much the people meant to me, how much I needed them, how much I loved and cared for them. But there's nothing I can do now, except move on...right?

I have lost control of my life. I have. I have lost mysself, who I used to be, of the things that made my happy, of the things I once found touching or profound or inspiring or motivating. I have lost most of my drive, my personality, my tastes and preferences. I want to go back to being Iqra, back in February. I want to go back to being as happy as often as I once was. For the first time in my life, I was absolutely comfortable with who I was, with my friends, with how I looked, with what I did. I had purpose, I had drive, I had energy. I was happy.

I don't know who or what I am anymore.

All I want now? To go to UF, to start fresh. To start classes, to get submerged in my passion. TO be excited for things again. To be happy again. I wish sometimes that I DID sign up for summer term. I wish I was already up there. Productivity keeps the mind occupied and creates the illusion of happiness -- or at least contentment -- like nothing else.

Last weekend of summer!

I slept over Kailani and Katrina's Friday night, woke up on Saturday, got stuff ready for Sunday (which was Eid) and spent Sunday with family.

Though I didn't get to have a wildly crazy summer, I was pretty productive, I left the house a lot and had some good experiences. I got to intern at a place where I could experience some of what my possible career would be, I realized how much I've grown since 9th grade and how much more willing I am to step up. I met with my KC officers and Journalism peeps. I truly realized how much I grew during this summer--if someone told me at any point in middle school I'd be president of a club or editor-in-chief of an entire publication, I would have laughed in their faces and told them they didn't know me.

I am determined to make senior year the best year in high school, both academically and socially. I am excited to expand and improve my clubs. I am not ready to have started with colleges, but I'm taking baby steps. This summer was a pretty good one. I traveled a little, I stayed productive and I got some R&R after the chaos that was junior year.

A really nice quote I got from the president of Questbridge to end off my summer and to the beginning of senior year (as well as the rest of my life!):
"If you don't trip a few times, you're not running hard enough." -Michael McCullough

Goodbye summer 2012, hello senior year! (D:)

Henna!

Cake we baked at Katrina's birthday :)

Sunday morning :)

How it turned out x)

They took a picture with me x)

Freshmen hallway!

I hope they appreciate it ._.

Before it got demolished! All 426 

Cutting out the faulty jaguars

Working the "panini cutter" which has the most terrible blade known to man and took twenty presses to get visible jaguars that we didn't have to hand cut the rest out

Late nights...or early mornings?

Because staying up late is what summer is about. This was actually a very hectic few days. Tuesday, I went to school at 9, helped out a kajillion teachers, went to the dentist immediately after then drove straight to Alyssa's for a late birthday celebration with all the girls reunited, stayed up till 7 AM, got up at 8, went back to school at 9, helped till 1:30. (Then came home and passed out). But it was all worth it.

Romantically watching the sunrise x)

Suzanne has her eyes closed...

I hate the dentist >:(

It's been two hours! (This was posted straight from the chair because THAT'S HOW MUCH TIME I HAD WHILE I WAS WAITING)

Dentist tools scare me

Easy being green?

I had to... :D (also this is from Jason Mraz's site, so if he can do it, so can we!)

Last week of summer?

Also known as the first unofficial week of school!

Teachers to help!

Teachers that were moving

Less fancy list of teachers to help

Visitors

This little guy landed on our fence the other day and my mom went and caught him with a sheet. He doesn't really know how to fly, or climb in the cage so for a few days we kept him on the floor with easy access to food and water. But he does a mean wolf whistle x)

What my day yesterday and today have consisted of:

Death threats from VS teachers = lots of work submitted

AP lit summer work and the Olympics!

So I took a break from all the work, and went to the beach in the evening. We have a tradition of going to the beach near sunset, waiting till it gets pretty dark, then we leave and go eat at IHOP or Panera because both are on the way back from the beach. I've never actually seen a sea turtle nest at a beach in Miami so this was really exciting for me. Last summer, I wanted to do a program called Sea Turtle Oversight Protection which basically makes sure that when the turtles hatch at night, they get to the beach but my mom said no because it was from 8 to midnight and she didn't want me going alone. .-. Regardless, this was a really cool thing for me to see, but seeing the hotels and apartments not even 20 feet away made me hope desperately that the babies would make it to water and not the roads.

Add caption

This is George Clooney's yearbook picture.

A summer of delicious food!

Because summer isn't summer without plenty of good meals and desserts so I made a giant post about all of the delicious things I got to eat x)

(Also I realize that this makes me look like a total fatty but I exercised and walked ten millions miles around FIU's campus! And some of it's homemade so I had to brag a LITTLE)

Apparently movie theaters have curly fries now...

Hummus?

Because my family has always gotten the Hershey's Pies from Burger King and now we could buy an ENTIRE freaking pie for ourselves

Legitimate hummus from our Jordan-ese neighbors!

IHOP at odd times of the night :)

Free slurpies on 7/11!

Jordan-ese rice, chicken and beef during Ramadan!

The most delicious potato soup known to man

AMAZING homemade chocolate chip cheesecake!

Homemade fruit tart!

Delicious Panera mac and cheese :)

Ramune soda!

Pancakes at odd times of the day...

Lots of cheesy pasta x)

I felt very American

Our demolished breakfast that I probably should have taken a before picture of...but it was homemade "jam", pancakes and eggs. We were teaching Suzanne how to cook!

Ice cream :D

Tower of caps

I know I shouldn't post all of this on the same day, but you have to understand how excited I got when I found out there was a Blogger app and I wouldn't have to email myself all the pictures from my phone, then download them, then make a post on blogger THEN upload them and wait 20 hours for my Internet to do the only thing in the world it's supposed to do.

SO, my last post for tonight, dedicated to the sophomores (now juniors, but whatever) that brought in a kajillion caps for me to count. So far, I've counted every box but the biggest and gotten 1500+ caps. So I thank you guys!

*UPDATE: 3500 caps!

Suzanne's farewell

In the first week of summer, my best friends and I parted ways. It sounds really dramatic and it kind of was. For the first time in 5/6 years, we wouldn't be able to spend summer together or hang out or be weird together or stay up till 5 talking on the phone. It felt very Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants-y.

Right after our last AICE exam on June 11th, Suzanne left to Virginia for her NASA program on Wednesday for the ENTIRE summer (she comes back August 11th, only 6 days to go!!).

I left for NJ/NY on Thursday so I was a little too excited to be properly realize. When Kailani left towards the end of June and Alyssa and I became pretty busy with actually being productive, I realized how much it sucked and also how much I'll miss them for college.

2 out of 4 at a racing track for Alyssa's birthday

The 5 of us! (and a new boyfriend)

Just like old times (also this is Suzanne's super fancy neighborhood)

She's probably the weirdest

The official last time all of us were together (featuring very sleepy and very sad teenage girls)

Internship!

So this is what has taken up all of my summer. From 9-5, everyday, I go to FIU south campus for an internship with the USDA and the agroecology department at FIU.
It's a wonderful experience and I've met some really wonderful people (and a not so wonderful scary ecoterrorist) but I have to say, it has been worth it. My inner (or maybe not so inner) tree hugger really squealed at the opportunities and everything we learned. It really confirmed that this is something I can imagine myself doing for the rest of my life. It was a 6 week program in campus and during the last two weeks, we worked on our research paper on a topic we learned, created a PowerPoint and went back August 6th to make a giant presentation to a room full of people about our internship. In addition to that, we also made a video about the internship and a giant poster about the six weeks

Here are some pictures of my FIU experiences (not a lot, sadly and including pictures from my long rides there and back). The last two days were definitely the most fun, as we not only got a mini party but a field trip to Fairchild Gardens.

They thought the coffee would be like fruit punch, "because you always see people drinking it and laughing!"

The scenic route home

$1 venti iced tea!

We visited Fairchild Gardens on the last day

A really old tree

My walk from the bus stop everyday

Not the best picture of us, but these are the people I spent my summer with. The background was really funny because at the moment, we were making biofuels from waste vegetable oil (with lots of chemistry stuff like titrations that I understood! THAT'S WHY YOU STAY IN SCHOOL!)

About half of us hiding in the shade. Every Friday we went to the garden and worked there--not pansy stuff like planting flowers, but uplifting old gardens beds, pickaxing grass away (I also realized I am NOT good with a pickax), transporting barrels of dirt and laying down new garden beds. It was at the FIU organic garden which is really cool because they compost everything themselves, collaborate with the FIU cafeteria and get coffee beans for use in compost, and have biofuel plants.

Not the funnest lab ever. It was picking nodules off plant roots.

Waiting to get picked up

The wedding area at Fairchild

A really pretty but really funky smelling flower

The advantages of being in the engineering building: lots of nerds

Long bus rides home .-.

Collecting water from the greenhouse pond to test for pH, nitrogen and phosphate