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faithfromanewperspective · 6 months

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Religious hurt, ministry burnout and all in between set to 5sos5 // Prologue: You don’t go to parties

I realise this is a rather strange thing to do, what I’m doing. I realise most listeners to songs don’t apply them to the things that I do. But I went through a lot, and this album is like none I’ve heard before: it celebrates and laments and everything in between the power of simple human connection and I won’t lie: it changed my life. It gave me back the pieces and tools to take my life back from a rogue machine of parts that was sucking me dry yet I couldn’t find head or tail of nor differentiate it from the hand that was feeding me, keeping me alive. In some ways, I owe it nothing: the $19.99 I fully paid on my debit card to iTunes that probably gave the four dear humans who created this album maybe a dollar each. In some ways I owe it everything. And so this letter is for you, the strange conglomeration of fandom and random humans I’ve connected to and who don’t know my face or my real name but I enjoy baring my whole heart to. It’s the mark of an artist I suppose. It’s the early symptoms of the fever dreams that allow practical neighbours with my childhood to come up with the visceral imagery that makes up these masterpieces: four voices, and a handful of instruments. I don’t have something nearly as brand-new and original, but this is my voice. And this is how YDGTP gave back my life.

Picture this: it’s 5am. Somewhere, certainly not where I am, but it might as well be when I’m far too tired for 10, 11pm when I’m barely over 20. I’m feeling stuck, overwhelmed, unable to go home, clock off, head to bed. I’d say I’m on my couch but that’s an optimistic statement to assume I have the ability to make it to something soft to lay down my head. I don’t even own a couch.

I’m supposedly somewhere that’s home to me, but if I had any sense in my head I’d kick me out. Out to where? I have no idea.

I wouldn’t even admit it to myself then, but I knew somewhere that I was happiest when I got up before the sun. 5am, after seven to eight hours of sleep. Maybe more, when I’m so tired and drained. In the early hours of the morning (and I feel like I’m betraying this song by saying it) before the world has risen with its expectations, if I can get my life together then, I’m prepared for when I have to interact and feel their energy. I’m also prepared to get my needs met, which they obviously aren’t, or I wouldn’t still be here now.

How am I feeling? Don’t get me started on that. I’m starving, empty, longing for something I haven’t felt satiated in for quite a while. Longing for a bygone time that wasn’t any good, because if I could go back now I could do better with the information I have now. And yet, the world is moving past, the people from that era drifting further and further away. Whatever it is I’m holding my breath for, is starting to feel like I’m waiting at an intersection where the gaps between the cars are getting smaller and smaller and each time I see one I could maybe go in I don’t. I wish I had gone in the previous one, because it was much safer compared to this. That’s basically what my life’s like. I’ve got the last five years running out my mouth. Won’t you relive it with me? Won’t you fix them with me?

Because I still think about the times we were heavy. It sucked, but at least there was connection, something that I’ve run completely dry on now. Racehorse tripping on the dirt that you’ve got on me. I never felt included, loved, but sometimes being insulted is just as good as it means I’m part of the gang. They don’t do that anymore: is it because I’m too fragile now, or because they’ve moved on from me? Vulture circling above of what’s left of me. Because I’m a carcass in the hot sun, at least that’s how I feel. Slowly, not slowly at all actually, rotting.

We go stupid every night, and it was meant to be fun. But.

What a tragedy. Because I’m still here in the darkness, back where we started. It set everyone else up to move on, why can’t I? Everyone else goes home and goes to bed and doesn’t suffer the consequences of the night disabling them forever, going back to the start again and again and re-living it and changing what they’d do because I know better now than I did then, time ticking by me and getting more and more behind. I can’t help the fact that I’m behaving the way that I am.

You make me a heartless monster.

So set this to a fun beat and go dance. Everyone I ever knew is standing in my house. (Are they real, or are they ghosts of people I feel like I failed, when I was never given the resources to be everything they needed?) Maybe I’ll be alright, maybe I’ll be able to put together whatever makes me feel better, maybe, maybe, I said as I invited them, filling up my heart again and again with relational one-night stands and superficial connection just to feel the high for a little while, it’s kept me going for decades. Kept me moving so I can forget that I had it the way I liked it once and I never appreciated it, I didn’t know that I had to. I didn’t know how much it meant until I lost it. I thought I was just fielding distractions, fatal attractions, but maybe the only attraction that was fatal was the one to the world of ableism and the solutions that they said worked for them when I know I need more connection than this superficial world, even one that says they worship something else, lives for something more, can offer. I wonder who I’m looking for.

But you got out. You don’t go to parties anymore.

It’s easier to get manic than depressed sometimes, maybe because I’m already depressed and I learned from young to act like I’m not feeling it. To think of others, think of ways I can help, prioritise hope and isn’t this what I’m doing here? Working towards solutions, why oh why did it go so badly? So I focus on the ideas, I let them stack up in my brain like a tap that’s running at full blast into a tiny plastic cup and when it drowns me just for a little while I get high and life is exciting and come up with good ideas of the world I imagine could be where I’m not alone, up in the clouds I’m not the only one dreaming of this dream. All my friends are up on mars. We’ve been travelling. It’s such a simple explanation and so exciting and it’s exactly how I should be feeling when I’m pouring myself out into something I care so much about, something centred on helping people, as if in a divinely inspired book we have all the solutions for all the world when we read it through a lens of science and adaptive management that constantly re-evaluates the fruits of what we’re doing and doesn’t let silly traditions that sap our energy get in our way. Shoot for mars. Why, oh why, does no one else stand with me here? Why am I still longing for that kind of teamwork, belonging, purpose?

So I lost my limit. It’s hard to find it when I’m so perpetually starved for the thing I need, that I try to make sure everyone around me gets. I’m dumb and I’m passionate. I care. And what’s the sacrifice of one person in the scheme of things? It’s not an accident. I was the one who took my foot up off the brake. Another lonely night.

It’s easier to put a smile on my face and go through the motions to this happy beat, yearning, pouring out the passion and love I wish I received on others.

Fill it with the best country drum solo I ever heard.

And remember where I am. Longing for connection. Where are you? Where is the one who I’m looking for?

But I know. You don’t go to parties anymore.

And that’s why I need to leave.

#personal mental health tag #burnout #ministry burnout #bipolar awareness #ydgtp #you don't go to parties #5 seconds of summer #5sos5 #if you're here because of the 5sos tags try not be too weirded out #i kinda can't believe i did this but it's a whole thing. more to come #youth ministry is actually just a party #that is built to be supportive #until you're giving of yourself i guess and that was me

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cinematicsoph · 1 year

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you don't go to parties [chapter three]

You Don't Go To Parties - Chapter Three

Rating: PG-13 ish

Warning: swearing, mentions of drinking, mentions of drugs

Word Count: 2,158 words

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Yesterday

“Hey man, I’ll be right back. I-I got to go…” Ashton trails off and starts walking to the door, leaving a drunk and confused Calum behind him.

He walks as fast as his semi drunkenness will allow him to, pushing through and sneaking past every person in his way. It felt slightly ridiculous, and he’d possibly regret it in the morning. But he just had to get to his mystery girl before she disappeared. He kept his eyes locked on her as she walks towards the giant staircase near the entry way and sits down. Don’t lose her this time, Ashton.

Suddenly he’s panicking. What does one say to a girl you don’t even know? Would he sound like a stalker? Would she run away in fear?

“Hey, Ash. Are you okay?” Ashton feels like the room is spinning but slowly turns his head towards the voice and sees Calum next to him. “Look, I didn’t care that you had to go but you look like you’re about to pass out. I can give you a cig to calm down.” Ashton hardly ever smokes cigarettes. Occasionally, he’ll smoke some weed with the guys but that’s about it. He doesn’t even remember the last time he smoked a regular cigarette. But what he does remember is the feeling of euphoria he got after it. Feeling nearly paralyzed and unable to talk, Ashton tries to nod at Calum to indicate that he does want one. Seeing as Calum nodded, pulled out two cigs and his lighter then headed for the door, Ashton assumes he understood and follows him out the door.

“So do you wanna tell me why you looked paler then Michael in the winter back there or are we just gonna ignore it and smoke?” Calum asks Ashton as he lights their cigarettes and puts it to his lips.

Before answering, Ashton takes the longest drag off his cigarette as he can and then blows the smoke out with a slight cough. “Promise you won’t laugh?”

“Dude. It’s me. You really think I’m going to laugh at you?”

“There’s this girl,” Ashton says hesitantly. He looks at Calum and sees his eyebrows raised in shock. “I really really like her. There’s just one problem. I don’t know her name.”

~~~

“I’m gonna go get a drink! You want something?” Kat yells over the music (if Cameron wasn’t deaf already, she definitely would be now).

“Yeah, you know what I like! Meet me at the staircase.” Cam goes to walk towards the staircase, and as she’s walking she could’ve sworn she felt someones eyes on her. She chooses to ignore it and continued to the stairs. She looks around the house, searching for anyone she may recognize. Then her eyes landed on him. Tall, handsome, prettiest eyes you’ve ever seen. She felt like she could faint right then and there, even with no alcohol in her system. She had to know who he was.

She can’t take her eyes off him. And it seems he can’t take his eyes off her either. Feeling her face start to heat up, she looks away in embarrassment. She lifts her head in hope to re-lock eyes with the handsome mystery man. Instead she’s met with an empty spot in the crowd of people where he used to be. She hates to admit it, but she feels a pang in her chest. She was thinking maybe, just maybe, she would be able to talk to him and get to know the man behind the handsome face. Maybe she scared him away. Maybe he wasn’t looking at her the way she thought he was. Maybe he-

“C!” Kat yells over the music, making Cameron jump out of her thoughts. Kat walks over to Cameron on the steps. “I got you your drink!” She hands the drink to her and sits down.

“Thanks,” Cam says sadly as she grabs the drink.

“Hey, are you okay? What the hell happened when I was getting you that drink?”

“Nothing.” Just the sexiest guy I’ve ever seen disappearing into thin air.

~~~

“You…don’t know her name?” Calum says after staring at Ashton, completely silent, for a minute. “Dude, what the fuck?”

“Look, it’s not as weird as it sounds. I promise!” Ashton throws his cigarette to the ground and stomps it out, despite it not being done yet. “I saw her at the very first party of the week and haven’t been able to stop thinking about her….okay that didn’t really fix the weird part like I thought it would. She’s just so pretty! I’ve seen her around campus, and one time I asked her for the time when I saw her just so I could hear her voice. That didn’t help the weird part either, fuck. Calum, look I don’t know what to do, okay? I’m going insane. It’s like a big giant mystery that even Sherlock fucking Holmes probably couldn’t solve!” Ashton reaches to grab Calum’s pack of cigarettes and lights another one. If he can’t talk to mystery girl normally, he might as well try to do it with a shit ton of help.

And a shit ton of help he got. He ended up smoking 2 more cigarettes and drinking at least 2 cups of straight vodka. If his liver wasn’t dead already, it definitely is now. But he still hadn’t calmed down. If anything, the alcohol and tobacco made him even more anxious about his mystery girl. That was until someone he didn’t bother learning the name of, offered him a joint. He’s not one to smoke weed often, but he knows the side effects it has on him when he does. He smoked the joint slower than he had the cigarettes, wanting to savor the feeling that washed over him every time he took a hit. The feeling of euphoria he was hoping to get from the cigarette finally washed over him making him sigh and relax into the couch.

It was almost ridiculous how high he felt after just half a joint, but it might have something to do with all the other substances he decided to use as well. He knew he was completely fucked up, but the weed calmed him down enough that he barely noticed. Honestly, he barely noticed anything. He didn’t even really recognize that it’s Calum who hands him a bottle of water and tells him to drink it until Cal sternly tells him to “drink the damn water, or so help me God, Irwin.”

“I’m fine,” he slurs but grabs the bottle anyway, in order to please Calum. “I don’t need any water.”

“Whatever, man. I’m trying to ease the hangover that you’ll complain about in the morning. Don’t come crawling to me when you feel like shit,” Calum says as he starts to walk away from Ash. Ashton sits there on the couch for a bit, staring at where Calum was, until he got bored and wanted to go somewhere else. He got up and drunkenly walked up the stairs to the rooms where he and his brothers sleep in, and where many people will probably be hooking up.

It’s a normal thing for Ashton to see couples in the hallway making out. It is not, however, a normal thing to see a beautiful girl, sitting on the floor with tears in her eyes.

"Hey, are you okay?" Ashton asks as he walks over to her, suddenly feeling a bit more sober. She looked up at him and his heart skipped a beat. It was her. His mystery girl. Fuck, okay, Ash. You gotta act normal. "There's a party going on, I don't usually see people crying up here."

"'M fine. Just a little homesick." She sniffles and brings her knees up to her chest. "I came here with my best friend but lost her somewhere in the crowd about half an hour ago. She was the only thing I really still have that's normal, you know? And now I have no idea where she is, and I don’t know anyone else here.” He hesitantly sits next to her but faces her instead of the other side of the hallway.

"I get it." He looks at her with compassion, a look she hasn't seen from anyone (other than Kat) since coming to this school. It’s an odd feeling. To get that look from a stranger. She looks at him and turns her body to face him. "It can be hard. Coming to college completely on your own, away from everything familiar." She nods and a couple more tears fall. Before he can think, Ashton reaches forward and wipes her tear away. He sees the slight blush form on her cheeks and panics. "I-I'm so sorry. I just...you are way too pretty to be up here alone, crying at a party." She blushes even more at this and Ashton begins to worry that he fucked everything up, trying to think of the easiest way out of this awkward ass situation without being too rude. I could jump off the staircase? No, there's too many people down there that would either catch me or-

"Thank you," she says timidly. "I appreciate it."

"Of course," he says quietly with a smile. "Now do you want to go downstairs to the party? Are you going to stay up here? I could even walk you to your place if you want?"

"I should probably go. I have a shit ton of homework and studying to do. It's like I can't keep up." She begins to tear up again, clearly starting to stress about all of the expectations college has.

"Hey, it's okay." He puts his hands on her shoulders, trying to ground her. "It'll still be there tomorrow. And unless it directly affects you now, it's not worth it. What's your major?"

"Film."

"Impressive," he says with a smile. "Why film?"

"M-My dad is a director. He used to bring me on set, if he could. I kinda just fell in love with it.” His attempt at distracting her had succeeded. She goes on a long tangent about how her dad let her work with the camera once she got older. Also how her parents met because her dad worked as a photographer for a bit and her mom modeled for one of his photoshoots. Suddenly she wasn’t stressed anymore. But she was incredibly aware of how much she had been talking. “Shit, I’m so sorry. You really didn’t need to know all of that.”

He shakes his head. “No don’t worry about it,” he says with a chuckle. “I did it on purpose. I was trying to distract you from the stress.”

“Oh. Well, thank you. I just honestly don’t know how I’m going to finish all this homework and pass my classes.”

“Look, don’t beat yourself up if you don’t pass, okay? There’s hundreds of people here that have failed a class. If you learn organization skills, pace yourself, and prioritize accordingly, you’ll be okay. I promise.” She looks into his eyes and he feels his face heat up. Oh God I’m blushing. I swear no one other than her better find out about this. She giggles quietly (probably at his blush) and it’s the cutest fucking thing Ashton has heard in his life. He makes a decision then and there that if they ever speak to each other after tonight, he will do absolutely anything in his power to make her giggle again.

“I don’t think I ever caught your name. I’m Cameron, by the way.”

“I’m Ashton,” he says with a huge smile.

“It’s nice to meet you, Ashton. And I’m sorry again for telling you my entire life story,” she says with a nervous giggle.

“Hey, it’s okay! As long as you feel better.” She nods and smiles. God she has such pretty eyes.

Today

“C, you’re freaking out for no reason. He has to be really messed up to freak out over that simple of a text.”

“What if it didn’t mean the same to him as it did to me? I’m probably totally embarrassing myself thinking that I even stand a chance with a guy like him. Knowing my luck, he probably went to his friends afterwards laughing about the poor crying girl who thought she had a chance! And the-“

“Cameron!” Katrina yells over Cam’s rambling. “Your phone went off, babe.” Cameron’s eyes widen as she picked up the phone and saw the contact name.

No problem. But look, I got really messed up last night and if I’m being completely honest I forgot everything that happened. Can we start over?

Start over? You mean a chance for her to pretend that she didn’t spill her entire life story to a man she just met? Say less. She replies eagerly, desperate to continue talking to him. She presses the button and after a few seconds her phone dings again.

I’m Ashton :)

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A/N: Heyyyy how y'all doing? This chapter took me way longer than I'd care to admit and I'm so sorry it took so long. I've been thinking about plot points and how to connect things and such so my mind has been running wild. I've also been thinking about Cold as Ice and oh boy have thots been thinking. Anyways, thank you guys, gals, non-binary pals, and others for reading and i hope you enjoy :)

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