A Tale From Her Broken Home

Have you ever had that need to do something that you truly love, but only to have it put in the bin because someone has told you that you're crap at it? Well it's happened to me.

Hi, I'm Gwendolyn Luxenburg. A weird name, I know, but it's the name that my mother gave me. I prefer to be called Gwen, and I am 16 years old. I come from a broken home, I'm lucky to even be able to go to high school. My mother is an alcoholic, so I learned to take care of myself. I would have a father if hadn't of hung himself when I was 6 years old, and my older brother Jared, is in jail, he stole from a jewellery store to get some more money for the family, but obviously, he got caught.

I like to sing, well I would like to, but it was my mother who stopped me in my tracks. I was just casually listening to music on my crappy mp3 player and I started singing to the song, I actually didn't think that I sounded that bad until my mother stumbled into my room. "Shut up! I'm sick of listening to that shit!" she would yell at me and would even try glaring at me, even in her drunken state, and she would then leave the room. That was when I was 12, and I haven't sung since then, I feel too embarrassed.

As for school, well let's just say I was just one of those random kids who didn't participate in any of the extra school curriculum's, and I didn't even go to any of the parties that involved alcohol or drugs. I am just known as the lame nerd that has no friends.

I remember when I was in Year 8, trying to figure out my Year 9 and 10 electives and I chose music. I could never understand why I did choose it, but in my opinion, it was a good choice, I enjoyed it, well most the time. What was really bad was that sometimes, the teacher would make us sing, and I wouldn't sing, I would just mouth it and would hope, every time that no one would notice that I wasn't singing. I've been lucky every time.

The only person who knew that I didn't sing was Hillary Swantuer. She actually wasn't my friend, she was one of those school bullies, I never really ever found out how she knew about that, but for Hillary, she finds out about almost everything, so it didn't really matter. She would actually try and give me the solo part in the song we would be singing at the time, but the teacher would ignore her and say that I wasn't loud enough to be a soloist and then he would pick someone else in the class, someone actually offering to have a go, someone who could actually sing. I was really envious of them, I mean who wouldn't want a skill like that?

I don't usually complain to people about my life, but sometimes I have to tell someone, you know? And if someone asks me, I'll just lie and tell them that everything is fine and that I have a normal and almost perfect life. That usually stops people asking me for a while, but then again, I'm never really asked, I'm a lame nerd remember?

As far as looks go, you could say that I'm pretty, I'm light blonde with natural streaks, average height and blue-green eyes, guys are so caught up in the fact that I am smart, I never go to parties, and I'm a very awkward person to be around, whenever someone tries to pick up a conversation with me, it just dies within 5 minutes, sometimes 10 minutes, depending on my mood. I'm not a very social person.

I'm also a very casual dresser, nothing too fancy, but nothing geeky either, I just don't think that it looks good, I normally wear very bland and boring colours so I don't stand out, it just helps me blend in.

But that's enough talk about me, let's get into the real stuff, this is where you get to experience my day to day activities, but I'm telling you, it really isn't that interesting...