I think too much.

"Do you know what you're getting into?"

This is the question others ask me and that I ask myself a lot. It's sometimes condescending, sometimes concerned, sometimes asked with the implication that if I don't know what I'm getting into I shouldn't be getting into it.

The truth is, I don't know what I'm getting into with absolute certainty and I never will. I'm 16 and have less worldly experience than I need, most of which keeps getting contradicted just when I think I vaguely have a model of the universe worked out.

I'd like to think that I'm not stupid, though, and that I can learn from what I've done in the past - and I have done quite a lot. I have learned from hard experience what I should not do and these days I'm not the kind to naively fall for the first thing anyone says. I have also learned that the places and people I thought were safe can be the most dangerous, and I've done things that would shock and worry most people but which I don't regret in the slightest. If I've learnt anything, too, it's to get out more and try new things.

Hopefully I'll survive and not get into a terrible situation - but life is an unpredictable thing and I can't truly know. That doesn't just apply to me, it applies to everyone, whether they're honest with themselves or not, and in no way does it mean that one should not take risks, that one should not fly in the face of what is acceptable, that one should not try to really live and not just exist.

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