My Memoirs of Chester Bennington

My Memoirs of Chester Bennington

I heard Chester committed suicide on Friday when I was walking on Treadmill in the morning. I saw this news on BBC and I couldn’t believe that at first. So, I googled about him and found that his suicidal news on internet. I think I forgot to breathe for a while. I was keeping telling myself “How could it be?” “How could my favorite artist commit suicide?”. I kept asking and asking and reading the news by wishing the news I was reading was not true.

My teenage memories were filled with Linkin Park, Westlife, N’Sync, Britney Spears, Backstreet Boy and Eminem’s songs. I didn’t like rock and alternative music. But I don’t know how I accidently listened to “In The End” by Linkin Park when I was in high school. I completely fell for that song and that song became my inspiration song later. Whenever bad things happened to me, I kept reminding myself that in the end it doesn’t even matter. I remembered the days I locked up myself and listened to the songs from their first album “Hybrid Theory”. I love every single song in that album.

It reflects my teenage life. I was depressed, I was not happy with my parents, I wanted to be accepted and fit in the society, but it seemed I was different from my society.

I was depressed a lot after I sat final high school exam and it took long enough until I went into college. I would like to name that depression as teenage crisis. I cut the connection with my high school friends. After we moved to new house, changed the phone numbers, I didn’t call them and they didn’t call me either as they didn’t know our new number. I think all of my friends attended the summer English class but I didn’t. I had huge insecurity and anxiety. I was introvert at that time. I talked but never opened up about me to anybody including my mom.

I am sure every teenager had some kind of crisis. I didn’t understand why my parents pushed me to do something that I didn’t want to. When I spoke out about the things that I thought, no one understood and they laughed at me most of the time. I didn’t understand why the world that I lived in was so devastating.

                                                                                             

My dad gave me lots of pressure in my teenage life. He wanted the good grades, he wanted to control over me, he wanted me to listen to him every time. He wanted to know every single friend that I was hanging around because he was afraid that my friends would be bad influence. So, when I had those kind of pressure, I wanted to stay alone.

But I found my way out. I felt a lot better when I listened to Chester’s songs. I could relate my experience with those songs. I felt like there’s someone who understood me and I felt like I was not alone.  I was feeling like I was living in the darkness. When no one was at home, I turned on those songs loudly and listening to those by closing my eyes. His music made my soul moved.

I didn’t know that Chester had tough teenage life which most of the people found it’s hard to get through. But yes, his songs reflected his bad experiences. He wrote about what he got through when he became singer and opened up about his teenage crisis. I still don’t get the fact he left the world by hanging himself. I couldn’t understand why he couldn’t fight his depression which he got through a lot. It’s a great loss and I feel so hurt. I feel like I lost my teenage friend.

I didn’t like a guy with tattoo when I was teenagers but I always told my friends that Chester was exception. My brother liked him a lot and he hanged Chester’s posters in his bedroom. He shaved his head when he was 15 and his reason was pretty cool. “Chester shaved his head, JT shaved his head and I’ve never seen Eminem with nice haircut.” He even got his first tattoo when he was 18 and he said that he wanted to have tattoo after seeing how Chester’s hot with tattoo.

It’s pretty hurt to know that he’s not here in this world. I was considering to go to his concert when I heard his band would come to Yangon later this year. Well, there are some songs which can relate my teenage crisis experiences and I am also sure most people can relate to those too.

                                                          

Numb

That song reflects exactly what I felt about the relationship between me and my dad. My dad gave me lots of pressure and I wanted him to impress me. But I failed to do so in my teenage years. He had high expectation on me and as I said before he wanted me to be a doctor. He wanted to be proud of me. He wanted me to have good grades at school and whenever I failed to meet with his expectation, he barely spoke to me. The following lyrics could exactly what I felt in those days.

“I'm tired of being what you want me to be
Feeling so faithless, lost under the surface
Don't know what you're expecting of me
Put under the pressure of walking in your shoes”

I think I even cried whenever I listened to “Numb”. I was depressed and I felt like I was living in the place where I didn’t belong to. He always said how much he spent on my education, how much he and my mom sacrificed in their life to make me and my brother have perfect life. Though he kept saying he was making us to have perfect life, I never felt that way. He said I needed to pay back by trying to be a doctor which I perfectly failed to make. Since I was told how much he spent on my education, I barely spoke what I wanted, which class I wanted to attend. I also understood one important rule in life that was if you take one thing from someone, you have to pay it back no matter what. This is “Give and Take”. Since then, I had strong desire to make my own money and depend on myself. Well, that desire was pretty good because it made me a person who depend on her own feet perfectly. I take that experience as the fuel in my journey to my destination.

I've become so numb, I can't feel you there
Become so tired, so much more aware
I'm becoming this, all I want to do
Is be more like me and be less like you

So, no wonder I cried a lot when I listened to this song.

Runaway

This song is from their first album. When the result of matriculation exam was out, I only got two distinctions and that result was far from meeting with my dad’s expectation. There was no way that I could attend medical college. So he said I was useless. That’s pretty hurt. Being said by your dad that you were useless.

“Graffiti decorations
Under a sky of dust
A constant wave of tension
On top of broken trust
The lessons that you taught me
I learn were never true
Now I find myself in question
(They point the finger at me again)
Guilty by association
(You point the finger at me again)”

I knew that I never wanted to be a doctor. I wanted to be a writer but I didn’t talk about this to my parents because they were not impressed about that. So apart from being writer, I didn’t know what I wanted to be. My dad asked me what would I do when I couldn’t make it into medical college. I didn’t have answer. I didn’t know who I wanted to be. All I wanted was to make him impressed. So, when I didn’t have clear answer, he asked me to leave the house. he said like that, I always kept thinking to run away. I always believed that I would be free if I lived in the place without him.

“I wanna run away
Never say goodbye
I wanna know the truth
Instead of wondering why
I wanna know the answers
No more lies
I wanna shut the door
And open up my mind”

But I take that was good that happened to me because I never think to depend on anybody in my life. What I thought at that time was even my own dad asked me to leave his house and said I was useless, I was really useless in everyone’s eyes. I used to think that I was nothing though.

Somewhere I belong

I thought about suicidal several times after the matriculation exam was out. I wanted the sympathy from my parents. I tried twice with the knife by pushing inside my belly and cutting my hand. But it was failed because I thought why I didn’t give myself a chance to try once more. I am glad that I didn’t do it.

“I wanna heal, I wanna feel what I thought was never real
I wanna let go of the pain I've felt so long
(Erase all the pain 'til it's gone)
I wanna heal, I wanna feel like I'm close to something real
I wanna find something I've wanted all along
Somewhere I belong”

That above lyrics influenced me to commit suicide because I felt I was living in somewhere I didn’t belong to. But thankfully I believed that I could find somewhere I belong by surviving.

The songs which reflects me and my dad relationship is not only those songs, there were “Point of Authority, one step closer and paper cut”.

Crawling

Well, I was so insecure. I was lack of confidence. During the time that I cut the connection with my friends, I believed that they forgot me. I wanted to be liked by all of my friends like any other teenagers. But what I thought was they didn’t like me. They teased me but because of my insecurity, I thought they bullied me. When all the beautiful girls were favored by both boys and girls, I was growing up wishing to be beautiful because I wanted to be everyone’s favorite girl. Though I don’t want to be that one right now, I had that wish when I was 16. That’s pretty funny. I always thought I was ugly, I was not as smart as my friends, I was not intelligent, I was dumb, I was different in bad way. Well if you were being said several times that you were not smart as your friends, you started believing that you were not.  So, truth to be told, I was happy when I didn’t make any connection with my friends at that time. Because I was the smartest person when I stayed alone.

“There's something inside me that pulls beneath the surface
Consuming confusing
This lack of self-control I fear is never ending
Controlling I can't seem to find myself again
My walls are closing in
(without a sense of confidence I'm convinced that there's just too much pressure to take)
I've felt this way before
So insecure”

In the end

This song means a lot to me. I can relate to every single lyric throughout my life. There were several phases in my life, but I can relate it to each phase. When I failed the exam, when I failed at work, when I failed my relationship, I put that record on to keep reminding myself that in the end, I doesn’t even matter. If it matters, it’s not the end.”

The last time I listened to song was when I broke up with my boyfriend.

“I tried so hard
And got so far
But in the end
It doesn't even matter
I had to fall
To lose it all
But in the end
It doesn't even matter”

Leave Out all The rest

Heartbroken was terrible which I tried a lot to get over. There were several times I burst out my tears while I was listening to this song. I thought it was my fault in my failed relationship. I wanted to tell what I felt to my then boyfriend at that time. We were different persons that we had different lifegoals which we couldn’t reconcile. I knew that but I tried to change to be a person to be more like him. But I couldn’t change it. When I couldn’t change which made our relationship failed eventually. I blamed myself. When I saw myself crying by listening to this song, I stopped doing that. I hate to see myself crying and depressed. But anyhow, I had some memories relate to this song.

“When my time comes
Forget the wrong that I've done
Help me leave behind some
Reasons to be missed
And don't resent me
And when you're feeling empty
Keep me in your memory
Leave out all the rest”

“Forgetting all the hurt inside
You've learned to hide so well
Pretending someone else can come
And save me from myself
I can't be who you are”

Waiting for the end

This song has same impact on me as Leave Out All the Rest. When I was getting through my first breakup period, I kept listening to this song. All the lyrics just reflect my hard times. I cried so many nights by listening to this song. After sending the break up letter to my then boyfriend, I was wishing he would chase after me. But he didn’t. That is why sometimes I regretted for what I did. I was screaming his name while no one was around me or while I was driving and kept telling why it’s so hard to let him go. That time was hard because I felt like all of my dream was shattered.  

But I don’t regret about it because I believe that I did the right thing.

Waiting for the end to come
Wishing I had strength to stand
This is not what I had planned
It's out of my control
Flying at the speed of light
Thoughts were spinning in my head
So many things were left unsaid
It's hard to let you go

(Oh) I know what it takes to move on
(Oh) I know how it feels to lie
(Oh) All I want to do
Is trade this life for something new
Holding on to what I haven't got

Breaking The Habit

After I passed through some certain depression period, I forced myself to change to be a better one. I encouraged myself to break the rules I had, to try the new things and adapt the different personality until it fits me.

I don't know what's worth fighting for
Or why I have to scream
I don't know why I instigate
And say what I don't mean
I don't know how I got this way
I know it's not alright
So I'm
Breaking the habit
I'm breaking the habit
Tonight

I wish Chester would be rest in peace. I wish he had a good life in this next life which he seemed believe it. I do thank him for making my life to be colorful with his songs. He was a great artist who influenced our generation.