I think I'm running away.

There's a better world out there. I've seen it, and it's calling me. There's nothing left for me here, you know? I'm a free spirit and I have dreams and potential. Most of you know how strict my house is. Most of you know that my mom's a radical republican and my dad's a DEA agent, and obviously I'm a hippie, and as most of you know I want to change the world someday. Being locked up here is giving me increasing restlessness, I mean, it's basically boiled down to this: If I stay here in El Paso, I'll never be able to start a band and I'll be in my twenties before I even meet anybody I could start one with, and I just can't allow that to happen. I've got to act fast or my entire future will be in jeopardy. If you don't know me, it goes like this. I believe that I was sent here to change the world, and that my calling is to spark a revolution through music. I want it to enentually lead to a second Woodstock. I'm geared toward forming a psychedelic folk-rock type band, something sixties-oriented at least. I've got fifteen bucks, a bike and a guitar. I need to get to San Francisco and I need to get there fast. What're my chances? Not much, actually zero. I swear to God I am dead serious about this. I need to get out. My life at home is destroying me. If only I knew of somewhere I could go I'd be OUT. My parents think I'm screwing around but I'm not. I'm sick of this shit. Screw it I'm fucking leaving or it will be the DEATH OF ME. As I said, there's a better world out there.

 

You're fifteen and at that age...and for the next few years, you're going to think you know everything. If you're going to leave, at least have a plan of what you're going to do...and if you leave, you know your parents will have the cops looking for you. Is it worth it? Is it worth all the trouble? At 18, you can leave and do what you want, but I strongly discourage you from running away right now. It will only cause more trouble in the long run...

Save up your money. get a job. Then, when you're 18, you can do what the fuck you want...and have some money to back you up.

 

Easy for you to say. You're 23. You don't have to deal with all the supression and shit they put you through. I strongly feel that it's holding me down from ever being able to succeed at what I want to do, and that's not something I'm willing to risk. I truly believe that we have one life and one life only, one chance. This is it, this is my time. I feel like I have no other way out. There's been increasing tension between me and my mom lately, to the point where she's plotting to send me to some kind of institution if I pull something. Flat out leaving is plan one, and throwing it all away is plan two. I'm ditching school tomorrow most likely. If I get caught then I don't give a damn anymore.

 

I may be 23, but I was 15 once. I planned on running away for years. My mother was a drug abuser. My dad was an alcoholic. I was abused. I was raped. I had to take care of my sister. I was working two jobs to pay the bills at my mother's house. Hell, I didn't even figure out who I was until probably two years ago because I was so caught up in that situation. I had my entire adolescence stolen away from me. Your situation could be MUCH worse...mine could have been too...but I didn't give up and go away. I stuck through it and I take pride in knowing I lived through that and survived. Instead of being a VICTIM...I am a SURVIVOR.

You're only 15. When you're 18, you're going to have plenty of chances. Instead of going about this like a child by just running away, why don't you sit down and have an adult discussion? Do you think if you run away and they find you (which inevitably will happen) you WON'T be institutionalized? You have a chance right now to be pragmatic, get your shit done with school and then do what you have to do.

Life is not black and white. It is not all or nothing. There are compromises you can make FOR RIGHT NOW. Get involved in clubs at school...join a dance class....take guitar lessons...do something that gets your mind off of your "miserable" situation. Give yourself something to focus on than your misery. When you're 18, then you'll have all the time in the world to do what you want...and if you get a job and save up...you'll also have money to back yourself up. Think logically here...it's the only way you'll survive out there.

 

Clubs at school? I'd rather slit my god damned throat. I could be GETTING HIGH right now. Screw that. I want to be wasted. I want to be a rock star. I want to be on the road. I want to be free.

 

Oh so instead of doing something with the world, like you first proclaimed you wanted to do, you just want to go out and smoke pot and waste yourself away. There's a solution to all of your problems

 

http://www.hipforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=187388

This is what I want to do.

 

He won't accept anyone under the age of 18...for legal reasons.

 

Damn it. Then I guess I'll die trying to crawl to San Francisco hauling a 20 pound guitar and attempting to ride my bike at the same time. Maybe I'll live and then later starve to death on the streets in beloved Haight-Ashbury with a cup of money at me feet and my guitar in my arms. Maybe I'll get raped or murdered trying to get from LA ti San Frsncisco. But who gives a shit? I'd rather die trying.

 

go to the clubs wasted?

and its not about want, and its not about drugs. being a rockstar consists of talent. just lock yourself away in you room n play your heart out. put all your emotion into the playing. and like DancerAnnie said, save up till you 18 then leave. maybe you should even open some stocks till then too. thats what i'm doing.

 

Then I guess you'll die a nobody who hasn't done anything to change the world at all. If you truely wanted to make a change, you'd be patient, doing what you can do to reach that goal right now...and continue working on that goal when you are of legal age....where your parents won't have a say in your life at all.

You sound unstable...

 

I'll try and not tell you what to do. I was 14 when I ran away. I didn't think I could bear to live with my keepers any longer.

It can easily turn out bad because there is lots to pick up on before one lights out on their own. What I did was a mistake and it led to more mistakes. I cannot regret any of it because it made me who I am now and I HAVE to like myself, ya know? But if I had it to do over again I would have used those last few years to prepare myself to go out there like a shooting star not a premature birth, heh...I would like to think I could have found an inner strength within myself to deal with those who try and change me or who do not appreciate who I am for that is an inner strength that is ALWAYS needed throughout life.

We are constantly surrounded by people who try us and sneer at others but I have to maintain dignity and live intelligently. If I were born to be anything in particular, than that would be my own particular lite to shine and sometimes when we shine too much before we are ready, it does not go as planned. I may have been born to do wondrous things but by foregoing the education and stable life needed to plod ahead in life, I learned to live hand to mouth. I do ok but there are struggles I would not have if things had been otherwise.

To really make a difference or go far takes bread. All the great ones had it and it lets people gravitate to you and depend on you...Look at Kesey, the entire Dead family...I don't mean to tell you what to do, (only you know that but live intelligently and follow Love and you will be fine, keep your faith)...But if you are planning to do with music what I think you are planning to do, that is a deep study already and I would spend these last 2-3 years studying the possibilities of transcension thru music, music like SCI, Robert Randolph, all psytrance...bands who can raise that spiritual energy and spin it up into magnificant proportions, bleeding love and healing all over the crowd.

Do your own thing, sister, but you have to be a real together cat to get the respect and following you need to take us all to a higher place, and it takes a little time to get it together. We each have an inner reserve of strength we don't know of, it is fathomless - be strong!

 

sis iknow what your feeling..but i'm one who left home at 14..had noother choice..but i can tellya at that age iended upin some pretty dark places before i got my shit together
at 15 if u leave, your most likely lookin at a few years of just tryin to find a wayto survive..your screwing the dream your reaching for
if its as horrible as u say & ibelieve it is, theres got tobe a smarter waythen runnin away to san fran livinon the street & endin up a junky or worse

 

I guess I must be fucking unstable if my parents want me fucking institutionalized. But I just can't stand it anymore. I just want somewhere to go, somewhere else. I'm just glad my dad's not home. He'd call the cops. He would turn my life into HELL if I DARED really try to run away. But thank God the bastards not home. He'd take me out of school, lock me in my room with nothing, and he would have me sent away in seconds. I have to get out. I have to be free. Every bone in my god damned body is aching to get out and if I wait any longer I will experience mental breakdown. There's only so long playing "Redemption Song" will ease your pain.

 

theres safe places ucangoif it comres down to door die.. but just doing wiyjhout a plan can lead u to..well hell
been thrre..wasnt pretty
but we can talk & can prepare u for what toexpect if uchuoose it..or offer possible suggestionsd ..

your not totaly controlled are u? upost here..your dads dea.. ya odviosly are already spereading your wings& becomming who u want tobe.. but jumpin out without a parachute only guarantees a big loud splat whenya hit..
please dont be hasty&forget to plan ahead

 

Where do I go? i need somewhere to go.

 

There are tons of kids that go through what you're going through right now... they deal with it until they are legal and then they do what they want to do...

If it's a really horrible situation why don't you find a legal way to get through it?

 

There's no legal way to escape.

 

im sorry to say, but you are really looking at your situation from a child's perspective.
i understand how you feel, i've been there done that and i have to tell you it didn't solve anything.everyone goes through this growing up, but i think that you need to grow up and make adults choices that are going to benifit who you want to be.
but just keep in mind that all of us here have been through what you are going through right now, we know its hard to deal with but its something that needs to be.

as eagle said, if it comes to do or die there are always child shelters and other programs set up to help kids.
but please, know that you will have to grow up and deal with this one way or another, i just hope you don't end up regretting what you choose to do.

most peace and love,
steele

 

I don't know the law there, but I believe you can become an emancipated minor legally at 16. You are really at a touchy age and your hormones and whatnot are probably messing with you and you may not be really thinking too straight. I know if I had to live under the thumb of a radical repub and a dea agent, I'd probably be trying to figure out any way at all to get away from it! But PLEASE don't throw yourself into something worse than what you are already in. At least you must prepare to survive on your own. What instrument do you play? Do you mean you can find NO ONE near your age with musical talent to start a band with? OK, well, I believe you if you say you can't. It's the same here. But really, how hard have you looked. Would your parents support you if you REALLY did find some fellow musicians to work with? When my hubby was a teenager, he had a horrid life with a mom who beat him. His dad got him a guitar and he totally burried himself in it, until he got power locally. He got enough power to tell his mom to get the hell away from him. He got enough power to tell the highschool principal to quit bothering him, 'cause he made more money playing music than the principal did... He got enough power that all the stupid kids at school who used to hate him, started wanting to be his friend so they could suck up on some of the power... And finally his mom came around and she personally saw to it that he had everything he needed to succeed. He ended up playing professionally for years, but alot of times even tho they were well known, hell, they opened up for Steppenwolf and toured with Joe Walsh, they still had nothing but a can of tuna to live off of 'til the next gig. And if you are that dedicated to the music there is not much room for too much getting wasted. Not if you are serious. Sure, once in a while, but the music has to come first.
I see someone who is quite emotional right now and you may not make the best decisions because of it. There is alot of difference between being gung ho about something and being emotional. I think the best thing you can do is burry yourself in the music, show them you are dead serious. DON'T get emotional if at all possible, but be straight foreward and intelligent when talking to or dealing with them. Show maturity. But make certain they understand that you are going to be yourself, and make sure that your SELF is doing what is right. Stay honorable. Stay in the right. Find yourself a job and save up your money. Don't spend a dime of it unless you need a new guitar or something. Keep the majority of it for a grub stake when the time is RIGHT. And if you MUST run away, make sure you always have enough money on you to CALL HOME.