I wish you knew me at another time.
A time when you didn’t have as much power over me.
Or maybe when your power wasn’t the only thing that I looked forward to.
Maybe that’s why I constantly pester you about plans. It’s not just that I need to know I’ll see you again, but to have something I know I can look forward to, put every thought in my mind towards.
It’s true I gave you the power, but recently I have been feeling that there is very little power I have over anything at all.
Or maybe I have too much power. Maybe it has been me all along. Wishing for change, longing to be someone who can be independent, scared to face the worlds challenges, looking for a way to make it all easier.
I don’t have many of those worries anymore. I really don’t feel much at all. It’s funny how so little time can go by and how much someone can change on the inside without anyone realizing. Who knows how many people have done the same alongside me that I will never know?
Cancer has been eating away at my family like locusts during harvest season. When winter comes, the bugs go away, there is peace and hope to repel away the onslaught to come. But it comes, and always takes more than before. First with one member, and just when we thought it was over, comes the next.
We talk about it just like people discuss the daily newspaper as a family. This is our life, this is our “new normal.”
Going home for reprieve feels more like a Cold War, waiting for something to explode. It is now more a question of when than if.
At school things are the same except totally different. I go to class, participate and talk with friends. I have been more involved than ever, even finishing homework assignments ahead of schedule, but every morning I wake up feeling empty.
They tell you that when you hurt, people will come to help you. I have found this to be far from the truth. I can remember the last time I cried, this week to be exact. It was the first time someone asked me what was wrong unprompted. It was the first time I let someone into my world, and that is when it becomes a reality. When the snow globe breaks and the water starts to seep out. And it hurts because you think it is your fault that it broke, but it feels good, all of the pent up water flowing freely.
And it’s not your fault.
It’s not your fault that senior year isn’t what they say it will be.
It’s not your fault that you met me now. When the winter is just beginning with no end in sight. Who knows when spring will come.
Who knows how many times until then I will reach out a week in advance.
And bother you to tell me when I will see you.
I just hope when spring comes, when the snow melts and the breezes warm the earth, I will be able to grow and bloom, and you will still be there, waiting for me too.
This story was written by Anna Houston. She can be reached at [email protected].
