Where I'm From

"Where do you come from?"

I will tell you where I come from.

I come from the shame of not knowing the answer and being bound to a seat nearly all day.

I come from the exhausting structure barely held together by a bell and only 25 minutes for a lunch break.

I come from a place where I can be denied the ability to eat an apple whenever I'm hungry during class or use the bathroom if I need to.

I come from the hours of solving nearly impossible math equations on a laptop, effort gone unnoticed because it's "what's expected" of me at the cost of my youthful eyesight.

I've been influenced, suppressed, and questioned why I'm so quiet all the time where I come from.

There's constant suppression of my thoughts that are unique from what I'm told to think.

I come from a place where diversity is encouraged, but I still face judgement every day for being different from the world.

To be different means to be crucified.

Where I'm from, it's cool to mock the perfect man who was crucified.

In this place, there are parties with alcohol and drugs and sleeping with the first person in sight is what's hot and trending.

In this place, having the highest body count is a game to the boys, but the girls who aren't virgins are called a "***" or a "***"... Because who would the boys be sleeping with if all of the girls aren't virgin?

Where I come from, saving myself for marriage is such a flex because of how uncommon it is in this day and age.

Maybe you can guess where I'm from.

I've shared a bathroom with boys in skirts despite the sign on the wall and lost my sense of safety all in the same day.

Homecoming dresses cling to the bodies of young, adolescent girls--of children, if you will-- like the static of silk that has just come out of the dryer.

Wheelchair access means having a bigger bathroom stall, but the rest of the doors open outward, making it impossible to wheel past.

If you guessed "High School", you'd be partially correct.

High school was the vessel, but the World is what caused it.

High school is the first piece of the puzzle. The next piece is "American."--a bigger picture of the brokenness of the World.

American high school is the most contradictory place I've ever been.

Healthy bodies are promoted, but there's hardly any nutritional value in the grease pooling on the barely warmed pizzas they serve. 

Two chicken tenders and a few French fries aren't going to last a learning, growing teenager until dinnertime, which leads to more small bites of Doritos and Hostess cakes without real nutrition.

Everything is beige. Beige food, beige feelings--bland, boxed, and barely warmed-- and it only leads to quick fixes.

If life were to follow the same set of rules that school meals follow, we would all erase the pain in our lives instead of adding nourishment to our bodies and minds to balance out the hurt.

If we followed the life of the food on our trays, we would have a false sense of healing through removing the pain we feel instead of trekking through it to reap the ultimate reward of getting through the mud.

America is my home, and I'm bound to my patriotism.

Bound to America, I am-- it's the greatest country on Earth...but also the worst.

Where "We have no freedom!" is what people use their free speech to shout.

Where "They're taking away our rights!" is what people cry when losing privileges means more work for them.

A place where feminism is a matter of who has it worse, men or women?

In this place, women sell their bodies and call it "female empowerment" and murder their unborn babies to erase the consequences of their actions. 

They follow science until it comes to infanticide because raising a child or putting him or her up for adoption would be far too much work. 

Children are no longer seen as blessings, but seen as hindrances to society. 

In this place, "Love is love", but only when you agree with what they believe and if you follow their corrupted narrative.

They wear the cross because "The cross is a cute design," but I know there's nothing cute about the 39 beatings our savior took and the three painstakingly long hours he faced alone, forsaken from his own Father. 

Where they say "there's no love like Christian hate", but in reality, I just don't want to support their sin.

Where the rainbow of promise was taken from God and used for their vows to sin. 

America is built on freedom. Love. Understanding.

My freedom rings, and I'm hearing the call.

I've answered my call, my call to something more. A savior who washed all of my sins and shame away with his blood. 

The perfect man who called me to live in the world, but not of the world.

In this world, I dare to be different.

Because this world may be the place I'm from, but there's something greater where I'm headed.

Pearls, luxurious gold, and angels walking down streets paved with precious gold, where there is no frustration or pain.

So where do I come from?

I come from the chains of my sins and the ocean of hatred and mistrust I once drowned in. 

I come from the World, a place of pain, hurt, and loss.

Only now I hear it calling again. 

The World calls me and asks me for my soul back.

The voice is soothing and alluring, like a siren's song;

Sweet and so, so familiar...but deadly and jagged at its core.

Voices luring me back into the ocean of my sin, the tides pulling my ship of salvation towards the icy waters. 

I'm hanging up the phone.

I'm saying no.

But this time, I mean it.

My years of drowning are over.

My soul is already spoken for.

The world may have bound me before, but my chains are broken

Lying in the dust, rusted behind me. 

I am set free with the blood of Christ--

All because God sent his only begotten son to die for our chance at a seat in Heaven.