Chapter 1
Not a single soul
remembers the beginning. Not the beginning of a forever expanding universe. Not
the beginning of a molten rock solidifying into a hostile planet to sustain
life. Not the beginning of mankind or their ascension of the food chain. Not
even the beginning of themselves in a dark, water filled womb.
Realistically
that is a good thing. The trauma imposed by watching these events come to pass
is far greater than the insight which it would provide. But it begs the
question, what if we could recall every event to the day; just a prolonged
blink of the eye and you’d be back in those shoes learning that life lesson all
over again.
*BLINK*
An
empty void. Drawn from an oblivion, our place where everything and nothing
exists at once. Blackness engulfs our being. Muffled voices surround us in this
dark room. They are our source of life. Unwillingly, we must entrust our care
with this voice. They nourish us and encourage us that the world is a beautiful
thing. Then suddenly, it’s all gone. Our quiet home filled everything we need
to survive, decides it best to evict us. Shrinking endlessly around our infant
body. The voice screams. An opening appears that we must squeeze through if we
want to continue to be. The world isn’t anything like we had been told however.
Rather than dark, nuke warm fluid surroundings; the world is bright white, cold
to the touch, and filled with aliens. Our only action is to scream as we are
overloaded with sensory input, and hope that the voice will put everything back
the way it once was.
*Blink*
Flashing
through time is a brilliant notion; the ability to flash back to any moment
from your life, who wouldn’t want that.
*BLINK*
The
dazzling rays of sun light shine through the dew covered windows. Tiny
particles of dust dance in the beams as more and more are thrust into the air
by tiny hands and feet. Birdies chirp outside in the big jungle as mommy cleans
up our toys and daddy makes breakfast. It’s Saturday, that means tons and tons
of scrambled eggs to be squished against our face. Mommy will try to clean us
up as big ‘brotter’ and ‘sissy’ complain about us and wanting to go out with
friends. We cry because everyone is getting loud but are soon preoccupied by
other things. Let loose to run free in a new shirt and clean overalls, we spill
our beanie babies all over the floor again. We doodle pretty colors on pages
with gray swiggles all over it. We make music with the squares on the
rectangle, and yank the mouse’s tail to run around the room. Nobody comes down
to see us right away. Nobody makes sure we haven’t managed to get past the
child proof locks. They aren’t worried about us doing wrong, we are a smart
toddler; unlike big ‘brotter’ and ‘sissy’ who ran out the door when a honk
blared.
We
have the ability to make mommy and daddy smile though. They forget all about
‘brotter’ and ‘sissy’ when we show them our mouse.
“Smart kid. Wants to use the
computer,” Daddy says.
“Oh she doesn’t know what that’s
for,” Mommy chimes in grabbing the flashing box from the counter; “She just
knows it’s fun to play with.”
They
take a picture of us holding up our mouse by the tail. They laugh when we
become dazed by the bright flashy light. What is that strange thing? They use
it so often. What is it for? Why do they press in that circle to make it click?
We take the box away from them and click the button to see the flash but
nothing happens. Two months from then we will receive a baggy with us inside. A
dozen pictures of little us playing with toys.
*Blink*
Obviously
not every memory can be as bad as birth, right? Wrong. Your naïve mind has led
you to believe good always triumphs the bad. It doesn’t. For some, there are
more times than not when you wish you had never been pulled from that oblivion;
they seek a way to return to it. Life is far more complicated than that
however. Struggling through every day is your only option.
*BLINK*
Every
day is a new adventure when we are little. The world is a giant playpen to
explore. If the opportunity arises to bring others along on that adventure why
wouldn’t we? As an innocent five-year-old; if somebody wants us to join them on
theirs, we do. That’s why when we wanted to play with the barbies, we played
with big sis first.
Big
sis was having a rough day. She woke up for school late and we got in her way.
We got her in trouble and then she came home and got yelled at some more. She
wasn’t allowed out because she had school the next day too, we tried to cheer
her up by letting her play with us but she had a better idea. We were told to
stand in the door way and that what we did as she said she’d start the game. The
door slammed shut on us so fast. The door frame was the only thing to grasp on
to, but it hurt. Crunch noises came from our hand and it swelled up red. Daddy
was right behind us as we screamed ‘bloody murder’. It wasn’t big sis’ fault.
We had moved and played the game wrong. She still got in trouble. The doors
were taken away. We could enter any bedroom and anybody could see us. We liked
this new ‘freedom’ but big sis didn’t, she ran away to her other daddy.
*Blink*
Arguments
between relatives are not an uncommon occurrence. Especially between step
parents and children, the results can wreck massive havoc on the family
connections.
*BLINK*
It’s
been a long time since we lost our doors. We’ve moved on. Big Sis and us
get along swell, but she still gets in trouble, she still hates Daddy. When we
get home from school, she cleans up the bedroom and we stay out of her way, we
do math instead. After dinner we play in our room by ourselves. Maria climbs
out the window to be alone too. She talks about leaving, joining an army to be
away from our “horrible” house. But she can’t do that right now. She has to
‘congraduate’ first.
When
Mommy and Daddy go to bed, after the only light left on is the blue flicker of
the television; Sissy climbs down. We run to the bathroom and watch as she
hangs ffrom the gutter and steps lightly onto the fence below. She walks like a
cat toward a chair to climb down softly and runs out the driveway. As she races
to a car in the dark, we scurry onto our top bunk and wait. Wait for her to
come home, wait for her to be happy, wait for sleep to consume us. We watch the
cars pass on the street; yellow car, blue car, white car, blue car, red car,
blue car; until the rhythm causes us to fall asleep right there.
Mommy
comes up stares to shake us awake. Have to eat before we go to school, but then
we eat breakfast there too; double the yummy.
Maria
isn’t there. Did she come home and leave already? Did she leave us forever? Is
she in trouble?
*BLINK*
The
Popo come to the house often. Daddy says they are friends and they want to help
us. Maria hasn’t come on time lately. She sounds funny a lot and dresses in
tiny clothes that mommy says would be mine if they didn’t have bad things on
them. Daddy is friends with all the cops now and knows them all by name; they
bring her home for us when she won’t talk to us. She tells them she gets hit
and is always hungry. Mommy doesn’t like us watching this. Sissy lies about it
all and people know that, we should never lie; people won’t believe you when
you tell the truth if you always lie. But what if she is getting hurt? What if
she is hungry? Every time Mommy or Daddy gives us a snack we bring half to Big
Sis. We check her for booboos while she lays down reading. Big Bro tells her she’s stupid, that their dad doesn’t care for them but this new dad does. He says she should get over herself and walks away, not before she tells
him that he’ll understand in due time.
*Blink*
Chapter 2
Out
of everything that we go through, it’s funny what we do and don’t remember.
Maybe it’s psychological, we suppress our thoughts all the time; maybe we’ve
come to know what is good for us and what hurts us on the inside. Why do we
remember the stupid stuff though?
I
can recall drooling blood all over my paper in first grade. I wiggled my tooth
so much that morning that I popped it out of my gum and my mouth filled up with
the iron taste of blood. It became too much to contain so it seeped out between
my lips and all over my morning paper that I was supposed to turn in to the
teacher soon.
The
fright that over took me every time I had to go to the nurse, be it from a loose
tooth, a checkup, cough drops, or the more serious projectile vomiting. I
quivered in my little body every time I had to walk down that long hallway to
the office that smelled like bleach. It grew longer each time I had to go,
although the distance of my classroom from the office increased each year as
well.
Playing
outside plinking cans with the plastic airsoft guns. Going crazy and chasing each
other around with semi-automatics until we started shooting each other in the
butt. It was a cushiony area, it didn’t hurt that much, it did sting for a
couple and minutes however.
Visiting my Aunt
and Uncle up the mountains is always a blast. The first couple of times I
thought I was good enough to ride my bike down the steep road. I couldn’t stop
and slide on the side of the bike scrapping my legs against the rocks. The
lodged into my shin and Daddy had to use tweezers to go into my skin and pull
them out after I had soaked in the tub to loosen it up and stop the bleeding.
My third grade
year we didn’t have a teacher. She still thought I was the best candidate to
receive the new dictionaries for the class though. I had to get up in front of
strangers and carry around dictionaries all night.
That’s also the
year I ended up being the very last student to finish the PSSA testing. It took
me ages to read through all the stories and pick my answers because I kept
changing my mind after reading another answer. That’s why I try my hardest to
be the first to finish now. (It’s weird how students would laugh at you for being
last back then but now nobody wants to be the first to hand in their tests.)
I can remember the
plays in school and how I never got a leading role but I was always commended
for being the best performer and the loudest one on stage. Even when I played the
Wicked Witch of the West for the Wizard of OZ junior; everyone said my death
scene was the best part of the whole show.
But I wasn’t often
given what I otherwise should have been. Even in choir, I never received solos.
A soprano one is better heard in the background to support those who can’t
recall the rhythm and are too meek to be heard.
Fifth grade my
teachers noticed my hair thinning. I hadn’t thought much of it then but I was
still forced to see specialists. They ended up sending me to a nutritionist and
they forced me to write down every single thing I put in my mouth. They were
wrong about what had happened. The thought it was a health issue. They thought
my deadly fever had triggered it all to fall out. They thought so many things
but they couldn’t decide on just one. And now it’s happening again.
Bringing my first
pet home. I had fish before but my allergies had prevented me from having
anything larger. Until my teacher brought in her hamsters as class pets and her
daughter became allergic to them. I bought them new toys, new snacks to try,
sawdust for their cages; I took care of them because nobody else would. They
were scared of being bit and now I ironically am as well because the one I had
trusted and loved bit me when she became to ill to squeak at me.
Working at the
Retired Naval Base in Warminster provided us an area to go-cart. We would set
up the tractor trailers and race each other. I could fit under them in my low
riding green cart because I was so small but the death trap yellow one and the
red bubble machine had to go all the around them. It was always fun riding on
the train tracks pretending we were going to collide until one of us chickened
out.
Each year we would
visit the zoo. Christian’s birthday was right before the start of school and we
had a family membership to go. Racing around to the boxes and turning our keys.
We wouldn’t even listen to them but we would get a new key each year to use in
the boxes next year. They don’t have them anymore and I hear they auctioned off
for millions. They almost got rid of the balloon too. The one you had to wait
in line for but when you got to the top of the string you could see all of the
zoo and the animals in their pens.
Laying in the
large portion of the tent but having it drip on my forehead as I slept. It down
poured every time we tried to go camping. It was fun regardless but why did I
have to be the one to sleep in the drippy spot?
Weekends were
spent down in the basement. Daddy would hang at the bar and toss us each a
quarter to get M&Ms out of the candy machine. We sat on the puffy blue
couches playing Super Mario Bros on the NES and seeing you could get further in
less lives. The secret passages above the levels became my new best friends
when nobody was looking.
During the summers
after we climbed back over the fence into our yard, we would sit on our towels
on the side porch and eat PB&Js. We’d have to wait half a hour before
climbing back over the fence to keep swimming so we’d lay there reading stories
to each other. Those times when I learned how to float on my back or sat at the
bottom of the pool increasing the time I could hold my breath are long gone
now. The pool was demolished after a hurricane filled it with large branches
and trash.
Days of playing
soccer at the middle school. We weren’t middle schoolers then; we were little
kids looking to have fun. But boys are aggressive, and there weren’t any girls’
teams at that time. So I joined them, and pushed back, I ended up hurting one
of the boy’s legs because he shoved me and I shoved him into the bleachers. I
never got to go back to the team after that.
But you see
there’s so much I can’t remember either. I can’t remember my Dad being late to
the hospital with pizza when I was born. I can’t recall my favorite field day
events. I can’t remember my favorite childhood book. I can’t remember when my
younger siblings were born. I can’t remember Maria leaving. I can’t remember
when Christian understood what Maria always said, when he started stealing and
became a drug addict. I can’t remember when I became so good at hiding my
depression. I just remember needing to be the strong one that my parents could
rely on and be proud of.
Chapter 3
When you move up
in schooling, going from Elementary School to Middle School, Middle School to
High School, High School to College; it’s meant to be a time for new
beginnings. You get to surround yourself with new people and redesign who
people know you as, of course if you still hang with the same crowd they may
influence what others see you as and you may be deemed a fake for wanting to
change.
Trying to reinvent
yourself is very hard. You need to know who you are and others need to accept
that; not just random people you know from science class, but your family as
well. If your family is struggling through other dilemmas, how can you possibly
change when so much else is changing?
How do you work
past the constant job changing?
How do you cheer
everyone up when all they can think of is that your brother is autistic and may
be taken away forever?
How do you
continue to do the things you love when you need to be free to help at home?
How do you get
ready for college if nobody is ready to see you go?
How do you get rid
of the stress and anxiety when it builds up faster than homework during the
first month of school?
How do you possibly
continue to appear happy but feel like dying on the inside?
*BLINK*
The room is
utterly quiet and the only sound is the scribbling of pencils on paper as the
teacher writes notes on the blackboard. Nobody dares to speak a word to one
another in fear of losing points. One student cannot understand however and
dares to ask the person in the next desk over for clarification. The teacher
gives them the stink eye but they continue in hushed voices. The two have met
before, they had class together last year; now it seems they are finally
beginning to notice each other. They have struggled through very similar
scenarios, one as a victim and the other as an onlooker. While the scenarios
are not one in the same they may still be able to help one another cope. Their
friendship will grow as they make idle jokes about history, as they involve
each other in everything they’ve gone through, as they stay up talking on the
phone or sitting on the roof together relieving themselves from their everyday
lives. Nothing lasts forever however, nothing can be perfect every second of
every minute of every hour of every day for the rest of their lives. Maybe the
time they have spent letting go will stay with them for the time to come though
and maybe they will be able to work things out on their own.
*Blink*
Chapter 4
Freshman year. It
may be troublesome for all, high school or college. Honors student or mentally
challenged. Popular or shy nerd. A new world opens up before you with new
challenges and new adventures.
Truman has offered
many things to their students over the years. Those who wish to sing can join
the choir. Those who prefer to dance can be a Showstopper. Sports teams.
Debate. Drama club. Environmental club. Tutoring. God Squad. Helping the
disabled. The possibilities open to you are endless. I chose not to get
involved in them. Much like most of my life, I let the opinion of others and
their wants to overrun mine. I should’ve played soccer. I should’ve been on the
lacrosse team. I should have been a SnapReader for our reading Olympics team. I
should have learned of the environmental club sooner. I should have put myself
out there to be up on stage. I could have done so much more than I let my mind
tell me to, but I didn’t.
My freshman year I
took the basic classes everyone took. I completed biology, algebra 2, english,
social studies, humanities, chorus, spanish 2; anything that I absolutely
needed credits to advance on. Very little did I bother getting involved outside
of these classes. I did try out for and obtain a position on the showstoppers
dance/singing group. I did join a juvenile police division to further my
knowledge of my intended field. But that was it. I didn’t bother trying out for
the sports. I didn’t dare continue the clubs I had been in throughout middle
school. I wanted change. And that’s exactly what I got, change for the worst;
to me anyway.
Sophomore year.
Things went even further downhill for my family. My father had been in and out
of jobs since he was ‘displaced’ from his job of 16 years at the Naval Base in
Warminster. He bounced from maintenance position to maintenance position
because he is either over qualified for the job, too old to remain there for
long, or they were not willing to pay him that which he had received prior.
Then my slightly younger bro decided he had enough with the torment of school. He has been through a
lot as well. He had a speech impediment for the longest time, he was
acknowledged to be of the gifted variety as are most of the kids in my family,
and he takes after my dad thus is picked on for his size and stench. After
being pushed to the brink however; he could not put on a smile such as I do. He
threatened to kill himself so others would silence the remarks. This outraged
the teachers and caused him to be taken away from my family. While he may
not have seen the commotion he was causing at home; he is the first born boy to
my father and is thus very significant; he did. It wasn’t until the doctors
decided there was nothing wrong with him other than being autistic he was
released back to us and we were left to pay the medical bills. We hadn’t even
had the choice of him being thrown into this ‘asylum’ and we were going to be
forced to pay the government with money we did not have. This caused further
issues for my family and further dug the whole of responsibility for myself.
Junior year. Initially
I joined the BCCAC, I filled college apps to get somewhere with good
scholarships, I became sergeant for the explorers’ program. But then; I dropped
all of my extra activities. I focused more on finding a job to help pay the
bills that were continuing to stack up. I almost gave up hope on continuing my
education. Eventually the ball dropped; my grandfather died.
My grandfather
from my father’s side had long ago died and never had spent time with my family
regardless. My mother’s father however, lived directly across the street from
us. He has helped raise us. He has helped pay our bills in dire times. He
helped my father feel like he belonged and we helped him feel loved. We made
sure he didn’t kill himself. We made sure he had the best equipment to continue
his side jobs he completed for friends. But it all went away with a simple
secret.
Due to the actions
of the rest of the family, we could not see the signs. We could not get him to
the hospital before he had his millionth heart attack and was induced into a
coma. We never got to see him after that. Hope seemed lost.
Eventually things
continued. I went back to explorers. I filled out college apps not realizing
what it may bring to my family. My dad went back to work. We struggled to get
through each day but we did it and we still do.
Chapter 5
Academics are my
life. They always have been, and I am nothing without them. I gave up choir to
fill my schedule with more science courses. I stopped going to showstoppers
meetings because I needed the time to work at home. I dropped Spanish classes
to take AP. And I almost gave up humanities to take even more science courses.
But it would have been too much. My life would have been too consumed and I
would cease to exist as a human being that can enjoy life. I seem to have
become that monster anyway.
Now I plan on
getting back on track. I’m going to college. I’m going to be the first to
commit to it and earn a degree. I will make a better life for my family. It’s a
huge burden on my shoulders but what else can I do. They raised me, I can’t
just leave them there to fall further into the pit which is America.
I will breeze
through my four years at York College of Pennsylvania and I will get in to
little to no trouble. I will work on campus to pay for the rest of my tuition
and gain experience. After I graduate I will get a job with a government
organization or local PD to be the part of our country that still tries to do
good, regardless of what the citizens may say.
After I can
support myself I will begin to put towards what I really want. I’ll have that
big farm house hidden from the public where my parents can stay. I’ll have my
own Beauty and Beast library. I’ll have a private laboratory for my own
studies. I’ll have an armory that would bow any MI6 members’ mind. I’ll be
self-sustained and give back to the community that still believes in good.
Maybe even try to bring those who don’t, back.
Chapter 6
All my life I have
worked to make others happy, I have tried to make the world better for those
who have it even harder than myself. You’d be amazed the reactions you get from
some folk. There are some who do not eat for weeks at a time and some don’t
ever eat fresh piping hot food. To be fortunate enough to take a shower, to
change into clean clothes every twelve hours, to be free to adventure or attend
school. A majority of people in America let alone the rest of the world; do not
ever experience this. It should be our number one priority to bring these
pleasures to everyone. But the world would much rather bicker over building
walls between countries, have court cases over who killed who, have wars due to
religion. If we could just leave the past in the past and continue advancing
our world we may have a solution to global warming, we may know if there is
more life out there on other planets, we may be able to stop these archaic
diseases from reappearing.
This is the
importance of life. Not the ‘who has better features’ ‘who can spend the most
money’ ‘who is most well-known’ crowds that pollute our streets.
Get rid of the
expensive luxuries and help others get the basics.
Do for others
before yourself.
Be a better
person.
