This morning I got up really early. I'm all alone at my house, and my friend had slept over to keep me company. She had to go to work, so I had to get up anyway, but I decided to stay and up and watch the sun rise. So I sat in the big red chair downstairs, with the fire going, blanket draped loosely over me, with a mug of tea, and watched the sun light up the beautiful place I call home. Scene out of a movie right? Well as I sat there, watching the world change, I realized how much I've changed in the course of my entire life. In sixteen (well almost) short years, I've gone from amoeba to person. And I've become a totally different person. Obviously, the last few years have been the most change emotionally, as well as physically. I've gone from innocent little seventh grader, to a sarcastic teenager, who, in reality is kind of a bitch. But in the last few months, I've changed even more. For one, I've started to realize what I want to do with my life, started realizing that, in a few short years I will have to take care of myself, which I haven't exactly had to do yet. But it's more than that. This whole year has felt like the final chapter of a book. I'm going from a J3 to a FIS kid. I'm going into eleventh grade. My friends are changing, my attitude is changing, my opinions are changing. Everything is changing. It's frightening, because it makes me realize, and really understand that someday, this will all be gone. I'll be dead, everyone I've ever loved and known will be dead, everything I know will be gone. Even the mountains, the formidable mountains, a superpower which rise over the valley I love, which greet me every morning, which feel endless, will someday be gone.
When I was little, I didn't understand death. I didn't understand why my dad didn't have his own dad, because everyone I knew had a dad. I didn't understand why my mom didn't have a dad, because, don't you have to have a dad? I didn't understand why, when we moved to Vermont, my parents had to change their will, to who would take care of us. I always just assumed that they would always be there, that they would always take care of me. I always assumed that they would never get older like my Nana, like the Schneider's, or the MaClay's next door. I didn't understand why our neighbor's baby never came home from the hospital. But I see it now. I see it in their faces, I know one day they'll die. And I know they are scared. I know that I'm scared.
So I've changed, because a few years ago, I would never have thought like anything like this. And I didn't realize I was changing, but I guess we never do until the change has really set in. One of the things this blog has done for me is give me a creative outlet, somewhere I can write my feelings, my thoughts. Because I never did before, believing that they weren't important, or even coherent.
I also realize that sometimes, I talk like I know everything, just because I'm so scared. The reality is this- I know almost nothing. Because next year, and the year after that, I'll again be thinking how much I have changed. I'll be going back and looking at this blog, and realizing I had no idea what I was talking about, and that I probably won't ever know. All the adults in my life seem so sure that they know what life is all about. I wonder if they act this way because they are scared, of the inevitable, of death. Because aren't we all?
When March is over, and April break ends, this chapter of my life will be over. This book of my life will be over. And I'm not really sure how to feel about it. But I'm never sure of anything, as we can;t ever be. The only thing I can ever be sure of is this- I will die, and anything and anyone I've ever loved will die too.
This should depress me. Which to some degree, it does. But to another, it doesn't. Because I'm reminded that change is inevitable, that it must happen, just like death does. Because change always gives way to something new, and if we didn't all die, then there would be no more room in the world, and I would be depriving others of life. So I see my death, and the death of everything, as a gift of life to someone else. It's something that must, and will, happen.
Although it's still sad.
"I'm miles from where you are,
I lay down on the cold ground
I, I pray that something picks me up
And sets me down in your warm arms"
“To the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure.”
"Baby shoes for sale, never used."
(credit to Hemingway, and Sammi for showing it to me)
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