"Iris" by the Goo Goo Dolls

I am writing this now in a state of depression. My head is literally reeling. I feel slightly nauseated. The blaring lights produced by the cars on the highway are definitely not helping. I just got into a fight with my mom about a pretty sensitive issue and as a result have spent the past several minutes hearing myself be called a "narcissist", and several other things that I hope you are never called.

I know that teenagers by definition have multiple moments during which home seems like an oppressive environment from which they need to escape. Ironically, the teenagers that feel the most this way tend to be the most privileged. I fall under that category. But in this case, regardless of who I am or how I might have acted, I feel alone. Every time my mom calls me such terms, thoughts begin to race through my head suggesting that perhaps because I am an arrogant, self-servient "princess" I do not have the right to be happy in life or to achieve my current goals. I know that at some point, I have to stop these thoughts from continuing to bring me down but because I never know how much I am in the right and she is in the wrong or vice versa, I can never decide when to stop beating myself up and regain my bearings.

The reason I selected "Iris" to help portray my current situation is quite complicated, but I will do my best to explain. During the aftermath of suffocating disagreements such as this one, I always feel that a part of my identity and self-worth has been chipped off. Perhaps this feeling comes from the fact that I am currently planted in a place where my fellow inhabitants do not understand me or where I stand. It's as if I need some proof of who I am coming from someone who knows me well to regain the piece of me that I've lost.

In life, there are very few people who know you, actually know you in the way you would want to be known. I have several friends who know certain sides of me very well or know me through specific experiences. But I know very few people who have thoroughly grasped my essence and could feed it back to me in times like these when I need the favor.

In times such as these, Edward always comes to mind. I know you are tired of hearing about him. The man is not even present and won't be for perhaps an eternity and at least a year. But seeing as he understood practically every side of me in the condensed period of time in which I knew him, it is hard not to rely on his memory to boost me up.

If he were here now, and I were to tell him of my situation, he would not judge me, make any comment, or go on a long tangent about the most recent argument he had with his mom. He would just nod and listen intently until it became time to change the subject. That's how our discussions often went. I would talk about an intense problem I'd been dealing with and he would listen and nod. For a while, it seemed as if he were listening as most people do, tuning in and out with a daydream or perhaps an image of an upcoming meal floating around in the background. But then I'd always be surprised when eight months later, Edward would reference a miniscule sound bite that had come from the depths of one of my rants.

In "Iris", the singer confesses that he does not want the "whole world to see" him because he doesn't "think that they'll understand." Perhaps he feels ashamed as I do about a certain quality within him that tends to rise too quickly to the surface, waiting to be judged. But somehow, in a world where everyone has faults that occasionally, if not frequently, emerge for public view, it feels natural to take comfort in those that have seen you both at your best and at your worst. I cannot take comfort in Edward literally, but somehow knowing that somebody out there understands me comprehensively is vaguely relieving. He could not support my dad in saying that I never give to others because he knows that I was willing to give him everything.

The whole world can never see you for who you are. I can't think of anyone who would want it to. But in such situations when I feel vulnerable and that my ideals are "breaking" around me, it helps to know that somewhere out in the distance, there's someone who "knows who I am."

Lyrics to "Iris":

Verse 1

And I'd give up forever to touch you
Cause I know that you feel me somehow
You're the closest to heaven that I'll ever be
And I don't want to go home right now
Verse 2

And all I can taste is this moment
And all I can breathe is your life
Cause sooner or later it's over
I just don't want to miss you tonight
Chorus

And I don't want the world to see me
Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am
Verse 3

And you can't fight the tears that ain't coming
Or the moment of truth in your lies
When everything seems like the movies
Yeah you bleed just to know your alive

Chorus

And I don't want the world to see me
Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am
Chorus

I don't want the world to see me
Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am

Link to Music Video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdHnygmMm9I