summertime sadness

It's kinda crazy to know that I'll be graduating from high school next week. The idea that I'll be finished with twelve years of waking up early primary education hasn't really dawned on me yet. I don't have to go to school this week except for graduation rehearsals, so I'm in this weird limbo state where I have absolutely nothing to do after noon. On weekends filled with last minute research papers the one thing I'd keep wishing for was more time, but now I'm suddenly left with so much free time it scares me. After getting out early from rehearsal at 10am and buying milk at Safeway, I headed straight for home and even though I know there are a bunch of little tasks I need to finish like completing my housing app for college and mailing a letter, for some reason, I felt like I didn't have any purpose. And I'm usually home alone so I'm used to solitude but this time around I had this hopeless feeling of emptiness and, though I wasn't physically tired, I just ended up going to sleep until evening. I realize that I tend to get this way a lot as summer approaches, and if I allow myself to, I end up - for lack of better terms - feeling really sad and depressed. (I say feeling because I hate using 'depressed' to describe myself, so I'm trying to mitigate it a little by making it sound like a temporary mood rather than a potential condition, and I also don't want to indirectly belittle anyone who is going through depression.) I'm probably one of the few people I know who don't look forward to summer, and it's because of the really dislikable person I become. After spending weeks in general solitude I end up forming really bitter and cynical thoughts about people who are close to me - people who the better part of me appreciates and would never have a bad thought about - for no rational reason at all. And I'd just end up sleeping over twelve hours every day, and I'd keep feeling tired so I'd sleep more until I'd be even more tired, repeat. Two summers ago, during a time when I could not care less about my future or school, my life would revolve around my computer and whatever MMO game I had found myself addicted to. Every day I would sleep at 5am and wake up at 3 in the afternoon. There was no future to me. I indulged and lived for the present, but you can't even really call it living because I was investing in something virtual, my life on the screen. At the time I hated the person I had become, but now I only have sympathy for the person I was before. I made sure that I'd be so busy these past two years that I wouldn't even have time to allow myself to sink down to that stagnant state where my lack of progress would incur self-hatred, something which fed on my will to live and my will to achieve. Now, as summer approaches, I'm beginning to feel worried about whether I will fall back into that depressing hole again. But then I remember all the crazy achievements I've made in the past two years, and all the great people I've had the luxury of getting to know better - including friends who I didn't think I could appreciate even more - and I know that I'll be fine because this time around I have things I want to accomplish for myself, and goals that I want to see myself fulfilling. I know that this time I'll have people who care about me who support me, but more importantly, I care about myself. I have purpose, and for now that's enough to keep me going.