by: Gabrielle Miller
Carver High School, Aldine ISD
Teens! The summer is finally here. There are no more three to five alarm clocks trying to wake us up for school, dragging Mondays, or long nights as we try to finish last minute homework or even projects. Students, we no longer have to struggle to stay awake during the long hours of lectures of what our teachers are convinced is teaching. There are no more hiding progress reports or report- cards. It is all because school has officially let out. The bell of transitions to class to class has ended, and our books have been shut. What we have begged for is now here!
During the summer teens become so free spirited and independent that they eagerly lose self-control. We forget the entire motive of encountering a break, to the point that we hold no restrictions on what we are willing and wanting to do. During the time of relaxation we do more than that. We take on the duties that our age does not permit us to do. At that moment we are then convinced that we are indestructible.
Going down the wrong path in the summer all starts with what we believe are minor situations. It may be the party that your parents warned you not to go to but you carelessly left anyway. Consequently, you were there to witness a shooting and thankfully it didn’t result to the death of a friend or even yourself. It could be that moment when you were too stubborn to call your parents, because you were afraid to tell them that your driver was too drunk to even say your name. As a result your body is left in the middle of a deserted street because of a car crash, and you are so torn to pieces that your mother is unable to identify her own child. This was all because you heard the words “I’m just tipsy”. Or it could be that moment when it was you drinking. You begin to drink because you told yourself that you’ll only take one sip, but that one sip turns into one cup, two, three, so many that you can’t even keep count. Through the midst of “enjoying” yourself you allow the alcohol to become you puppet master as it takes over your body. You then ignore everything around you even the second that your drink becomes poisonous. Before you know it your body becomes helpless; everything around you becomes darker than the country’s midnight sky. Nothing is comprehendible and you are unable to stop the fight. The fight of you being raped and molested because you were drugged, but the moment you wake up you are unable to capture the truth. Because you are lost mentally and have physically lost minuets of your life that you can never be regained.
See this is reality; female or male, Black or White. It can happen to anyone. Although, I am not saying that spending time with your friends or partying is impossible to do because it’s not. It is the fact that teens are more likely to be at risk during the summer. Statistics for teens doubles and even triples during then months of May-August than any other months, so this summer let’s be responsible. Let us not be celebrating your death before the next school year comes around.
