We are creatures of habit. Our routines allow us to remain calm, our systems keep us sane. Schedules are our lifeline, without them we would surely crash and burn. We wake every morning to the sound of an abrasive alarm, we dress in the dark, and we run down the stairs. We sit through class after class, telling ourselves the lunch bell will ring soon enough. When it does, we gripe and complain that the time allotted to us is never long enough. Four more classes we stare blankly through, and the bell rings again. No one need tell us what to do, we know. Some of us climb aboard an overcrowded bus, some head out to the cars glittering in the afternoon sun, and still others stay, trapped in an educational prison. We go home, endure whatever waits for us there, and then get back to work. Eight hours every day for thirteen years, of course, would never suffice, so we work outside of those barren white walls until our minds are reeling. Exhausted and void of all feeling, we go to bed, already dreading the next day for we know it holds the same dried out routine.

Day after day, month after month, year after year we march on to the rhythm of our system’s drum. It takes its toll, and the ones who bore the most weight finally begin to crack. Depression settles in, but we keep moving forward, forever propelled by the hands of a clock. We keep moving, forever pushed by the hands of those who say they know what’s best for us. A dark hole forms where our stomachs used to be, an empty cavern that will remain as such until the day we finally break free, but for many of us, it will simply be the day we forget to breathe. To fill the void, we drag stainless steel blades across our wrists until our skin is numb and the bathtub is stained red. Our feeling only drives itself deeper down, no matter how much pain we inflict upon ourselves to draw it forth from it’s hiding place. We turn to pills and flames and hanging ropes and towering bridges, until we find the solution that silences our lungs and closes our throats.

Those who sought to keep the rhythm ever beating on have finally broken the ones we all believed to be invincible, untouchable. Our warriors are dwindling as new information is hammered into our skulls, labeled sloppily as “education”. More and more of our valiant soldiers are dropping dead on the battlefield, and still no one seems to care. We have knowledge of mediocre facts and trivia, but are blind to the real world. We know all about the people who came before us, but are told that our own emotions and actions will never amount to anything more than standard and forgettable. We scream and cry and slam our fists against invisible glass walls, our efforts to escape held in vain. We still walk in circles and our habits remain. We envy those who are no longer with us, we are jealous of the ones buried six feet deep in a pile of earth! We pity those who are still forced to march along side us, eyes glazed, minds numb, with battle scars that will never fade.

Yet, no one sees the issue. The system can not be foul, for the system was created by those who know best. The clock was kept ticking by those who only saw dollar signs and charts showing our country’s success over other nations children. We are race horses. The minors you call your future are being treated as pawns in a sick game of chess, instead of actual human beings.

But of course, there is nothing wrong with the system. I am wrong, for I am merely a seventeen year old girl. I am simply someone who has lived through the horror story, felt it’s effects, and lost close friends in the ongoing fight to be good enough. I am only a victim. What could I possibly know?