Dear Holden

I thought the readers of my blog would enjoy a creative piece:

“All good books have one thing in common - they are truer than if they had really happened.”

Ernest Hemingway

Dear Holden

 I guess I am just going through a phase, you know: it is the sort of thing my parents, or anyone here for that matter, just doesn’t understand.  Well, my dad says he understands—he tells me that he was just like me when he was my age.  But I don’t know; I don’t like thinking of him as ever being the same as me. 

I know, you probably think this whole depression thing, which I am sure is coming across, is just another lame excuse from a spoilt kid who got kicked out of boarding school, and is just looking for a bit of sympathy.  You are also probably thinking: get over it rich boy, shit happens, everyone has family issues.  Believe me, I wish I didn’t have issues with them—you know, my family: they really are the nicest people in the world.  Still, my psychiatrist at this prep school tells me the whole separation at an early age thing could have driven me to seek substances—you know, as a sort of coping thing.

 I am not really a drug addict or that bad of a kid though, especially compared to the other kids at this school.  Like there is this Russian kid, well he lives in Greenwich Connecticut now (his dad stole millions from the soviet-union in the 80’s) that really has a wicked coke addiction—and come Monday morning after every weekend, he brags about all the strippers he paid to fuck in the city.  I mean, come on, how could I be that bad?  I have only done coke like three times: two of the times were here in fact, with that kid Vladimir. 

If you really want to know what I was like at my old prep school, I am just going to say that everyone knew me as more of the chill stoner type.  When I went to school there, I didn’t think getting high was really that abusive at all.  You know, it was more that I got high for inspiration.  Sorry, I forgot to mention that I am a really good photographer, and that I am kind of the artistic type.  Not in that faggy sort of theatre kid way, but in that cool hip way. You know, like real artists.  That’s really why I smoked pot and dropped acid from time to time.  I used drugs to expand my consciousness a little bit—you know, to see things differently.   

Well anyway, I guess that new headmaster that kicked me out of my old school, really couldn’t understand that.  I think that’s why people told me—to try to make me feel better at least—that he sort t of made an example of me.  You know, to show people early on that the school was changing, and he didn’t have any tolerance for my sort of thing.

 Let me give you a bit of a background first, so what I just said makes more sense.  My school, before this guy, use to be kind of a hippie school—like, we didn’t have a dress code or anything gay like that.  Everyone just wore their own style: you know, even the meat-head athletes weren’t really that boring.  I guess you could say that it really wasn’t like this place at all—fucking shirt and tie every day, and a dude that walks around campus, and takes notes on where you are at all times.  And really, at least there were girls at my old school.  Come to think of it, you know, until now, I never knew how much of a difference they make.  Like for example: right now, I am thinking about last year and this one that really broke my heart.  She was just the prettiest girl you could imagine.  You know, her look was really original, and she didn’t wear all those lame preppy clothes the other girls do.        

Anyway, sorry about my rambling: I know you are probably sick of hearing me yap away about my feelings and stuff, so let me tell you about how I got here.  

Well, let’s see, the day I got kicked out, was one of those really beautiful early fall days in New Hampshire.  It was still hot, and you could still go swimming in the lakes, and the leaves were just on the edge of turning.  It was the second Saturday after school had started, and since I had arrived at school a week before, I had been partying for like a week straight in my dorm with my best friends.  Well anyway, I guess I should first tell you how I got the booze for the partying, because that was what really what got me kicked out: how we got the booze, not the booze itself.  Anyway, me and my roommate that year had decided that since I was coming from oversees, I would purchase several bottles of booze at duty free, and he would get a fake ID when he was visiting his brother in New York.  O, I forgot to tell you: my parents live oversees.  They’re diplomats, and that is why I was oversees.  It’s funny, I don’t know why I always forget to mention that to people.  

Anyway, the day I was just talking about was real nice, and after classes—yes, we did have class on Saturday—we decided to go for a little hike in the woods so I could take photos for my AP photo class, and so we could get high and fuck around.  Anyway, after we were in the woods for a few hours, we came back to school and started drinking.  Sorry, this is kind of hard for me: the last thing I remember about that day was being in the back of a car surrounded by blue light, and then getting pulled out by a cop.  The rest of that day, and the couple after that, seem like a blur to me now.