The day before yesterday was a bitch. In the morning I had one of those moments in which you disagree with everything. You know, you can't talk without getting the feeling all you say is in vain because the other is only trying to be right and not listening to you.
Let me tell you about an experience of mine. A while ago, a very good friend of mine, Scott, whom I consider a brother, started a discussion about his movie collection. He tried so hard to get them all together, they're selected with care and he feels that his taste is much more sophisticated than those of the 'average' dvd collector.
Oh, I admit, he has some good movies. Buuuut... as I said, I was having a moment in which you disagree with everything, so I started to argue with him.
Big mistake.
He got agitated when I started comparing his 'top-notch' movies to my anime collection ("Anime is for kids!". Well, it didn't end with that. Scott and I rarely fight and even if, then it's nothing more than just an argument. But this was different. Due to some family matters on my side, things heated up more and more. The moment I thought that is was over, he stabbed me in the heart by commenting on the sensitive family matter. We started yelling at eachother.
At some point, I was boiling with anger. I opened the door, threw him a murdering glance and slammed it shut.
If looks could kill, he'd be dead by now (if not, the door which was smashed in his face would've done the trick for sure, whoops...).
In fast pace, I walked towards my car and drove home while playing Dimmu Borgir during the entire drive, which is about one hour. I was angry.

By nightfall, I reached my house. Because I didn't feel like socializing with the rest of the familiy, I parked the car at the parking lot and sighed. After I finally got out and granted my house the first look since I had arrived, I was even less appealed to go in. I walked towards the car again and laid myself down on its rooftop. The night was clear. I stared for at least half an hour at the ocean of stars above me, when a sad feeling snuck up on me. I felt lonely.
Soon, it started to rain.
"Only loners and dreamers stare at Star Ocean", Scott used to say when we were somewhat younger.
I sighed. Time to go inside.

The next day at work, I walked into the teacher's lounge - I'm a teacher - and said 'hey' to my colleagues. It had been some time since I last saw most of them, because I don't officially work there, anymore. I just do research to finally get my degree.
Anyway, I got a colleague to let me observe a student during his class, who has ADHD. My friend Dave is one of the school coaches and he told me this kid was everything but an angel.
When I saw the boy, I wouldn't have believed Dave if I didn't see it with my very own eyes. It wasn't just the ADHD, but the kid also suffered from the 'Gilles de la Tourettes' syndrom, where a person starts to shout, yell and call everybody names out of the blue. He was small, smaller than most others in his class and yet he frightened them all.
The teacher didn't pay much attention to it all and let him rant and shout until he stopped. Everybody acted like nothing had happened and the class continued as before.
After numerous other events, class was finally over. I talked to the teacher some more, after which I made my way towards the exit, where I came across Dave again.

We were about to start our cars (vroooom!), when we saw something happening in the bushes.
"Dave, something's happening in the bushes, over there".
"Luckily I have my camera with me. Never leave the house without your camera, my girlfriend says. She's always in the mood for more material and the videostore is running out of new videos..."
"I don't think this is going to be very exiting for her".
"Why not? She gets excited about me, too".
"I s'pose you have a point there, let's go".

Dave would be putting his camera away with a disappointing look on his face soon enough, because what we saw had nothing to do with his girlfriend's interests (brrrr... those tree huggers give me the creeps). We saw the boy from class today getting beaten up by some of the older students. They called him 'freak' and would have surely injured him even more badly if it weren't for Dave and me who kicked the crap out of them (remember kids, don't fuck with your teachers! (In both ways!!)).

The boy cried and had wounds all over his body. Dave and I got him back to the school nursery, where he was being looked after. I felt sorry for the little dude, being treated that way just because he wasn't like other kids.
Before we left, Dave told me his family had put him up for adoption because they couldn't handle him. I was startled by this sudden explanation and looked at the kid again.
"Are you alright?" I asked him.
With a sniff the kid dried his eyes and looked up to me (yes, yes, I know, I know. Save the crap about my height for another occasion, my dear colleagues. This is a written column, seriously!).
"Yeah... thanks, teach. I'm glad you're my friend."
That touched me. It made me realise how miserable the kid had to feel sometimes. Unable to have any good friends because of his serious problems. He was to be transferred to another school, but because his adoption still wasn't arranged, there were some problems, such crap!

On the way home, I thought of Scott. After seeing what happened today, I suddenly realised how important it is to have good friends, and that I was on the ringe of losing one, this morning.
It was dark and again it rained when I arrived at Scott's house. Silently, I got out of the car and hestitated. Afraid to enter the house, I turned around and looked at my car's rooftop. A sigh escaped my lungs. Once again I took place upon it and stared at the stars above me.
Was I a loner or a dreamer...? I shrugged. What difference did it make, there was no-one to tell me. I sure felt like a loner, though.
"Want coffee, or something?"
Scott was standing next to my car and shrugged.
"Hey, it's not like you have to or something. I just thought you might like a cup of coffee".
I started to laugh. "I'd rather have an umbrella, coffee isn't going to stop the rain from pouring down on us".
Then we both started to laugh and apologized to eachother for what happened yesterday. The coffee we had after was pretty lousy, by the way.

With all that I had seen that day I was glad that I still had friends. I sure as hell wouldn't have liked to have the problems of the boy from that afternoon's class.
Only loners and dreamers stare at Star Ocean
Well, I'm glad I'm not one of them loners.

Black