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The Next World

We were told you can do whatever you set your mind to. This was not a lie.

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The Next World
Cameron Hogan

A light mist of rain grazes my face with a somewhat pleasurable motion, I look ahead. Parents, teachers, brothers, sisters, cousins, uncles, grandparents are all here, the ones that have lived to this point in this very moment. I look back to see friends, colleagues, ex-girlfriends and friends that I have saved and destroyed. I look down at my green gown. Bittersweet. I'll remember high school, but I for once look ahead in my life, not to the hardships that are sure to ensue, or the people that I'll never talk to or see again, or even the unevenness of my sure to be doomed unsure, risky future.

Blackness. 5:02am. I sat up realizing if what I had just dreamed about was a sign of coming events. I couldn't possibly know where life takes me in those two and a half months. But what I do know without hesitation is that I'll make it through life with my new found perspective. I was on my way to school last Thursday through my neighborhood and I saw a man on the ground. I helped him up and his eyes told me the things he's seen: the events he has witnessed. I found out from this man that he was one of the last few scattered WWII veterans.

My life hasn't been an easy one. Now, I'm not gonna go into sob story mode like I do when I'm on the phone with my friends. That was the old me. He's gone. Forever. I've had 18 people die in my minuscule high school career, I've lost friend groups, lost my religion, lost who I was; the man I once was died multiple times. But as nights like these. Pinochle shifting moments that could determined the course of my life for my existence. I for once embrace this feeling that has come to me so many times throughout my life. I have been too blind to see it. I see the world as what most people only see once in their lives, for I see it as a constant in my perspective: the new world.

With everything bad that has happened in my life, which is a lot more than most people my age, I see it as now just a speck in a large portion of my life. That it will be okay, that not every relationship is meant to be, that you can't keep every friend because some people come in your life as friends, and some come in as lessons. That you will fail and succeed a lot, and that you must let the universe set the events that will happen to you in motion and stop trying to off-set them because you're scared. Because everything happens for a reason. And sorry the universe is bigger and more powerful than you. That working hard and being a good guy comes at a price, but it also has benefits that are sure to reward you later in your life after the bad things happen. The Law of Averages gotta catch up sometime. Law of averages is future events will balance out or provide for the bad things or lack of things that have previously happened in your life. I have figured this out. I have reached an equilibrium--I'm not in pain, but I'm not drowning in ecstasy. I'm at where I'm at--not given too much or too little. I look forward to college in 5-6 months; I will be studying Broadcast Journalism and minoring in Communications. I look at the new world that has endless opportunities and is just waiting for me out there to grasp. That we all can survive in this new world, but that is only if you chose to see it in a way of giving yourself up to this polarized society.

Everything you want or need is possible if you look forward. We all get to come back from this world. I see the world as not what it is or I want it to be, but what I commit myself to how I work and function in society as a whole.

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This article has not been reviewed by Odyssey HQ and solely reflects the ideas and opinions of the creator.
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