Advanced Essay Writing, Spring 2013

The first funeral I attended taught me the fragility of life, to cherish my life every day, and that one’s presence is truly present enough because one does not know when it will end. On the sixteenth of February 2003, I attended my Grandpa’s funeral. He, Vasili, was an immigrant to this country. In 1939, he left behind 12 brothers and sisters and both his mother and father, who specifically told him to flee, as Germany began to invade Poland in the beginning of WW2. In both the Ukraine and Germany, he studied to be a veterinarian but his degrees did not uphold in this country, in order to practice veterinary medicine. Also, his English was not without heavy accent, nor grammatically correct, and always over pronounced. This did not help his job prospectus. English was the last of seven languages he acquired throughout his lifetime, including Russian, Ukrainian, German, Polish, Czechoslovakian and Latin.

He was a no nonsense man. My fondest memory of him was the way he taught me to blow my nose correctly. Grandpa did well for himself overall, despite his difficult circumstances, which is why I revere him. I have always respected him not only for his intellect and discipline but also because he basically reincarnated himself, began a new life, all alone in New York.

Accompanied by my Grandma and my father’s brother’s family, he moved from New York to Seattle, then San Francisco, where he passed away. He suffered a severe stroke and several years later died peacefully in his sleep. The first mumbling utterance of his mouth, post-incident, was my full first name, Alexandra. This always made me feel connected to him, in a very special, almost spiritual, way. I still can recall the feeling I discovered when I found out that information. I feel I would do it injustice to even attempt trying to communicate something so indescribable. I was his first conscious concern and his first grandchild.

My immediate family and I flew out to San Francisco for his funeral, although his remains are buried in New Jersey, along with many ancestors, all of whom I never knew in this lifetime. My Grandpa’s funeral was my first funeral, as I declined to attend my Nana’s funeral, which was held at the church directly across the street from my first school, because I really did not want to miss class. At such a naïve age, I did not comprehend the greater significance of these types of events and still regret to this day that choice. A funeral is the one last opportunity to see one’s face in person, the last chance to celebrate and remember one’s life surrounded by people he or she knew, each person having a different perspective on the deceased.

During the solemn ceremony, I vividly recall approaching my grandfather’s casket, prostrating, and kissing the center of his forehead. Something within me changed. I felt an immediate uncharacteristically overwhelming explosion of emotion, which I had never experienced. Instantaneously, after removing my lips from his cold skin, I began to cry. I cried on that day. Oh boy, did I ball. I could not stop. It was incredibly loud but not disruptive. The tears were steaming so smoothly down my face, I couldn’t even see out of my own eyeballs, or wipe the river away from my face fast enough. I crossed myself several times while walking away from the casket, staring down at the tan floor. I could not even acknowledge anyone, especially in the eye. I turned to face the altar, perpendicular to Grandpa’s casket, just like I was taught, still balling. I had never felt that type of uncontrollable discomfort and could not keep it together to save my life. The old women gave me relatively consoling looks like I was the most depressing thing they had ever seen considering their stature in life. I was so young and so miserable.

I relate the loss of Grandpa to the loss of Columbia, NASA’s space shuttle. Approximately two weeks prior to Vasili’s death, seven astronauts were killed in the bizarrely unclear explosion of an American space shuttle. Neither the pieces of my grandfather’s life or the ridiculous governmental problems that led to the demise of Columbia are ever going to be able to be pieced together precisely. The occupation of Poland is similar to the administrative problems of NASA. Much of the documentation was destroyed or appears never have existed, but the lives involved will be cherished, remembered, respected, and revered by friends, fans and family. The uncertainty of when one’s life is going to end will forever preside for all of humankind, regardless of what he or she accomplished during his or her lifetime. It is not a choice; it is inevitable.

It was a typical lazy morning as I got out of bed and got ready for school. My tiny apartment was abuzz with my cousins Sarah and Danny getting ready for school, and my brother throwing yet another tantrum about not wanting to go to school. My grandmother was making Turkish coffee in the kitchen and my grandfather was watching the news on the Russian channel. I remember this routine so clearly because although we weren’t what you would call ‘routine’ people, our mornings started off about the same way. My mother put our lunches in out bright colored bags as she yelled at us to hurry out the door before we were late for school.

We had only been in America for about several months and I had hardly known English, but as the events of that day unfolded, I came to realize that for some things, language is not a barrier. I remember sitting in my third grade class when someone knocked on the door and barged in telling my teacher to turn on the tv (I am guessing that is what she said because I can’t say I understood her, but right after she left, Mrs. Levinson turned the TV on). This day was not a memorable one just for me, but for many as people all around the world watched the Towers fall with hundreds of people inside. This event caused a lot of turmoil for me, because I was a child living in my own little world, oblivious to everything going on around me. Although everyone in my family did not directly suffer from the attack, I did experience a loss with the realization that the world was not as bright in reality as it was in my mind. This event that affects us to this day in ways I could not have predicted as a third grader opened my eyes and woke me up from a dream. It was the first time that I was a part of history in the big picture- the first time I understood it anyway. It’s not that I suffered for a personal loss, but I did feel pain for all those who had; in a way, this was the event that darkened the colors in the room I had created in the little cubicle of my mind.

I remember coming home, still not having understood what exactly had happened. I walked into the room, my grandfather had the TV volume turned up to a deafening level and my grandma was sitting at the dining room table folding laundry. I asked my mother what was going on, as she responded in Russian, “Don’t worry honey. Go do your homework.” But I was relentless, because having seen what I saw in my class, I wanted to know what had happened and how. Then, my grandma told my mom I was old enough to know, and she recited to me what was reported on the news. It wasn’t just confusion that I felt; it was anger and this feeling like I was weak in the world where even the highest buildings could crumble. I don’t think I understood it at the time, because I was too busy feeling things I could not comprehend. But looking back at it, I realize that this was the event (or at least the event I am conscience of) that started my cynical views on the world and humanity- it didn’t happen on that specific day or the day after, but it was the seed that somehow veered me into being who I am now.

Not the teller anymore

2010 was an eventful year in many ways. It was my first and probably the only year when I got to live in the city, New York City that is, for the entire length of its span: Partying into the wee hours of the morning and blowing my money as if I were the heir apparent of a kingdom. It was the year after I came of age, and felt if I was coming into myself more and more as the months passed by. I also started developing a strong affinity towards literature and finally found an excuse to pursue institutional learning—an appellation not without a pejorative undertone—once again; in effect I was going to give college another chance. I had played with the idea sporadically and perfunctorily until one day, brimmed with frustration from taking everyone’s non-sense, as a server at a restaurant (Tokubie 86), I decided to sit down and forge a letter filled with such redemptive sentiments that would evoke the sympathy of even the cruelest debt-collector. And forge I did.

On December 22^nd of that year, as usual, I was crawling my way to work and literally two blocks short of getting there was when I received an email from my college. It was a confirmation with details about my accommodation at Union College—the recipient of the aforementioned letter. I still remember being at the door of a Starbucks café and telling myself, “The hell with Tokubei, I am going to finish “Brave New World” today.” My euphoria got amplified with each cup of coffee, and after justifying and putting an objective spin to this emotion, the happiness still felt like an absolute reality—an emotion strong enough to duel with the desolation of death. After several attempts from my colleagues to contact me and understand my absence, ask they did, but I did not tell. I was not the one obliged to tell any longer. Obama, on the other hand, was completely revoking “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that day.

April 15th, 2005. I turned 14 three days before and just got into one of the better high schools in New York City so by all accounts I should have been ecstatic. But I wasn’t. I was miserable. So sitting there on my dimly lit bathroom floor I was going to kill myself. I remember everything about that moment clearly. From the feeling of the sink at my back to the way the shadows fell across the floor. Most of all I remember how I hated every fucking little thing about myself at that moment.

With my vision blurry from the tears I picked up the knife in my right hand and pressed it against my left wrist. Pressing it into the skin I felt how cold and sharp it was and I stopped. I couldn’t do it. Death was so final, and above all else it scared the shit out of me. I don’t believe in God now and I didn’t then so there were no expectations of heaven or hell but it was still terrifying.

I out the knife down and just sat there staring at the wall and crying for the longest ten minutes of my life. It felt like I’d been sitting there for hours. But my parents would be home soon with my sister and I wasn’t about to let them find me like that in the bathroom. So I washed my face, walked out of the bathroom, put the knife away and then sat down on my bed, put on my headphones and drowned out the thoughts in my head with loud music.

That was the last time I came close to attempting suicide, but it wasn’t the last time I thought about it. I used to hide this story from people thinking it was shameful. It’s not. It made me who I am today. I was an asshole before then and I’d like to think I’m no longer one but I suppose that’s for everyone else to judge. They can judge all they want because their opinions no longer bother me. I don’t know if your life really flashes in front of your eyes before you die, but I’m damn sure glad I didn’t get to find out.

Thinking about what was the most important life scene of my life, I realize that it is difficult to choose one because it comes to my mind many things that have been important and have marked my path, my desires and hopes. But I can say that the most important day was the one where I first decided to go on a trip with my friend Yuri, to Florida.  That happened on April of 2002.

We were nineteen, the age at which every girl wants to make new experiences, explore the world, learn something different from their culture. Yuri and I share the same desires. The fact that my parents give me their authorization to make this trip was for me a satisfaction because I realized they had put a lot of trust on me.

I organized the trip. I booked the flights, I chose excursions, did everything with enthusiasm. The city in which the plane had to land was Miami. My friend Yuri had family living down there and they provided us a place during our stay in Miami.

Yuri and I flew from Guayaquil, Ecuador, a small town in South America. The flight took four hours. We arrived at Miami International Airport, here began the funniest situation because neither Yuri nor I speak English. The only sentence that we memorized when we were at the plane was “ I need somebody that speak Spanish”. Fortunately, the immigration agent was bilingual. Yuri’s relatives were at the airport waiting for us. “Great city!” I said. My intention was to visit and collect everything from that city. The fifteen days trip, had to be exploited until the last minute.

While Yuri and I were having fun in a host city, more than half a million people march on the streets of Caracas, Venezuela, protesting against the Venezuelan government. The protest last two days when Chavez returned to power. After learning about that difficult situation in Venezuela, I started thinking about my future in my own country, Ecuador, where similar situations could happen. Nothing positive comes to my mind, so I realized that here in the States I could be more secure and have more opportunities to success. At that moment I decided to stay in the States because I felt that this adventure would fill my soul with security and with opportunities to success.

So, those fifteen days vacation time turned into eleven years of my life since I decided to stay. Now I am in New York City, the city that has brought me fun, adventure, love, job, and education. Only brave people takes vital decision and risk. I took it on 2002 and I proud of myself that I did.

It’s late August, just after sunset, and Frances is watching the Maine coast get dark from the cottage balcony, her head leaned against the railing. She is seven, ten years younger than me; we’d just met that day. She and her little sister (five) had arrived that day, in tow of their parents, their father an old friend of my mom’s college roommate Andrew. The tiny cottage he and his wife, Heather, had rented was full to capacity: them, their sons Alexander (nine) and Elliott (six), my mother, father, me, and my sister. Next door housed Heather’s college friend Molly, and her clan: parents, sister, husband, daughter (five), twin boys (a year and a half, each).

The kids had run circles through the houses all day, multiplying and dividing, combing the rocky beach for sea glass, helping (hardly) with a jigsaw puzzle in the sunroom, eating, wrestling, climbing in and out of laps.

But here’s Frances, serene, looking at the ocean. I sit next to her and ask what’s going on. She looks at me and says sometimes it’s nice to be alone. To not have to look out for her little sister, or do what her parent’s ask. I laugh and say I know what she means. It can be tough to be the older sister.

It wasn’t much of an event, but that night at our hotel (my family kicked out of the cottage because we were four full grown bodies, and there weren’t enough beds) I couldn’t shake that moment from my mind. I was about to start my last year of high school, a few days from my first college interview, but something about this made me really feel like I was finally growing up.

In August of 2010 U.S. estimated  that the BP oil spill had leaked 5 million barrels of oil into the water of the gulf coast and only about 800,000 barrels had been captured and contained. A government report stated that only 26% of the oil was still in the water, the rest having “evaporated, dispersed, or been captured and eliminated.” I think this links into my story because it’s about what lingers below the surface, the seen and the unseen, and how sometimes things that should disappear remain and change you.

Summer of 2002, my family decided to visit relatives out of state, across the ocean in China. Normal weather for a summer, we were staying at my grandmother’s house for a month. In that time we would be able to visit the long and numerous amount of relatives and friends my parents know but haven’t seen in years. Plans were being made about where to go and whom to see in a week by week list. It would also give us time to figure out to whom the gifts go to for whatever reason. I never figured out why certain people got one box of the same thing instead of the other.  It was also the year Taiwan pushed for another public break from China, told and repeat by guests and family at meal times.

Much of the trip was standard process, meet, greet, eat, give and goodbye. However a unexpected visitor appeared middle way into this vacation, one no one expected to see so soon. Certainly not me; though that the time I hardly knew the guest. My grandmother is a stronger, sturdy and knowledgeable person given the fact she walks six flights of stairs in her 90s; I had no trouble asking her about this guest. It wasn’t an unwelcome guest.

“Grandma, there is something you need to see. I don’t know what it is.” I said quite sincerely confused. ” It’s been appearing for a few days now.”

“What it is?”

I showed her the evidence (or is it better called gift) in question as it lays in my laundry basket prepared for washing, a pair of underwear with spots. She chuckles, actually chuckles before saying “Oh, that was the problem.”

She then proceed to another room, pulls a small packet from the closet and showed me what to do with it.

“You should have told me when you started. This is normal. It last for about seven days. Place the pad like so on your underwear everyday till its gone.”

Grandma then goes in a more indepth explantion of the process till I called it quits. There is only so much I need to know at once. That was it; my intro into life as a woman. I can’t say that I completely change from girl to woman at once but there was a difference after the fact. Much like Taiwan’s push for a break from China I was breaking from what remained of being a child. The difference isn’t so big in essence however I wished at the time I could have understood what such a break would mean.

Tuesday, December 3, 2002

I couldn’t stop coughing.

While it had lingered there for several weeks, on this particular day it was relentless. Cough after cough, my face reached beet red. My peers ignored the board and turned their attention me and my racking cough. The frustrated teacher had enough of my disruptive cough and I was sent to the administrative office. Much to my displeasure, he had done so just a short while before recess!

The secretary rolled her eyes as I, a second grader, declared that I was too sick to attend class. She had heard that excuse too many times before. After placing her hand on my not-so-warm forehead, she emphatically declared it “just a cough” and admonished me for wasting her time. However, she decided to play it safe by dialing my mother, who had custody of me at the time.

My mother too was skeptical to say the least. Between coughs I tried to apologize – she was searingly mad about having to be pulled away from work. On the drive home, I asked her to turn up the heat – I was becoming cold. It certainly didn’t seem anything too ominous, as the winter of 2002-2003 would see record snowfalls and freezing temperatures. As we arrived at the apartment, she instructed me to change into sweatpants and go to my room.

Yet I was becoming more cold.

What came next was the most terrifying 15 minutes of my life. The words cold, freezing, chills and painful don’t accurately describe what the subjective experience was like.  I felt cold, a freezing cold that I didn’t think was even humanly possible to feel. I began shivering, which quickly transitioned into practically convulsive chills. I remember struggling to put on the dark blue sweatpants, but my hands were shaking beyond my control. Whether I was a brave-beyond-my-years 7 year old or (more likely) I was simply gripped by shock, I didn’t shed a tear. I spent almost 10 minutes attempting to put on the second pant leg and finally succeeded. I gathered every blanket within sight and burrowed myself in bed under the sheets, trying to gain some semblance of warmth.

I was overjoyed that the freezing cold petered out after about 45 minutes. I was alive! And I was warm now. Almost too warm, a bit hot. The rest of the afternoon my temperature would climb dramatically to the other extreme as a severe fever set in. I would later have my temperature be recorded at 103 F. The coughing too returned with a vengeance, with sharp and suffocating chest pains.

My father called to check up on me, I would get to have visitation with him the following night. Perhaps having grown up in trying times in post-war Ukraine, he had a keen sense for detecting illness. He was alarmed to hear my cough over the phone and suggested my mother take me to the doctor. In spite of all the coughing over the past few weeks, it was something she frankly neglected to do.

I struggled to make it through the night as I labored through each breath. It felt like I was drowning while having a 50-pound block of concrete on my chest, an observation which I would discover had a great amount of truth in it.

Wednesday, December 4, 2002

Why any of this was happening to me was beyond my grade level. What was abundantly clear was my health was sharply declining. After spending the previous day experiencing shaking chills and gasping for air throughout the night. I insisted on going to the doctor and my mother at last obliged.

I was quite familiar with my pediatrician, who had served as my primary care physician since two weeks after birth. Albeit on this day, his facial expressions were strange to me. After hearing a list of my symptoms, he placed a stethoscope on my chest and instructed me to breath in deeply, something I had done on plenty of occasions. I strained to breathe in and out three times. His eyebrows shot upwards with a mix of concern and inquisitiveness. He asked me to repeat the breathing a few more times. From what I recall, the next thing he did was immediately rush over to the phone on the wall and dial a radiologist with an office nearby in Brooklyn.

The fever and fatigue was taking its toll. A few minutes after being driven over to the radiologist’s office and signing in, I was brought into the x-ray room. I was uninitiated with the machines, and from what I did know about them, they were frightening. The assistant place the cold metal imaging plate against my chest. She instructed me to hold my breath and quickly scurried to another room to shield herself. I dutifully complied and then returned to the waiting room, expecting the worst to be over.

A few minutes later, the chief technician – a tall bearded man with a pained expression, hastily ran into the waiting room and was pointed by the receptionist towards my mother. After exchanging words with him, her face soon shared the same anxious countenance. I was rushed into the car and my mother began speeding away. I asked her what was wrong. Where we going?

She was equally curt to both questions. “It looks like severe pneumonia. The hospital.”

I wasn’t sure what severe meant, probably a word similar to bad. Yet I had heard of pneumonia before! Being the avid reader I was, I recently had devoured a series of historical fiction books covering the immigrant experience. Pneumonia outbreaks apparently occurred with great frequency and were quite lethal. Even a character my age had succumbed to it! What would become of me?

We soon arrived at the hospital. As my temperature climbed, it all seemed a blur. We didn’t wait too long thankfully. An IV was inserted in my arm and a clear bag with an unknown liquid began releasing its contents into my bloodstream.

My father soon arrived, running into the room. We’d have to have our Wednesday visitation in the hospital.

I passed out shortly after.

Thursday, December 5, 2002

I stirred awake at 1am to discover I might have to be moved from the ER to a different hospital. The children’s ward was full and from what I surmised the hospital official said while they weren’t overtly refusing care, they had no choice but to move me by ambulance. With my life hanging in the balance, the poor bureaucrat soon faced the combined wrath of both of my parents. When I woke up again, I was being wheeled into a bed in the children’s ward.

The sequence of events are a bit fuzzy in my mind, being thoroughly medicated for most of the duration of my hospital stay. I was ushered through multiple x-rays and a CAT scan. To my dismay, I learned there was nothing feline about computed axial tomography. The machine was even more dreadful than the stand-up x-rays. I was placed on a flat surface and told not to make a single movement. As the comparatively gigantic machine whirred to life, I was being mechanically moved towards the scary circular enclosure. I shut my eyes and laid stiff for what seemed an eternity. The process was repeated on a few more occasions during my stay.

The results were back and the pneumonia was confirmed. Despite the reassurance of my parents and the nurses, I was facing steep odds. My lungs, specifically the small sacs called alveoli, were filling with liquid. The liquid was hampering my blood oxygenation. I was hooked up to oxygen tubes. The situation was so precarious that if the liquid did not recede, I’d suffocate – effectively being drown from within. The surgery required to drain the sacs would also be incredibly dangerous. Fortunately, the antibiotics and my immune system made the necessary progress and I came back for the brink.

Lasting Impressions

Hanukkah had begun a week prior, and Friday was the 7th day of the festival. I got up to roam the halls of the children’s ward, walking for the first time in a while. With the doors to each room open, it was heart-rending to see all the suffering that occurred to innocent kids, from shrieking babies to limp adolescents with terminal cancer. With the hospital being located near a Hasidic enclave, fervent prayer in the rooms were a common sight, but the prayers weren’t always answered. It raised questions that I would later ask about faith and God’s role in the coming years of orthodox yeshiva schooling.

Nevertheless, local members of the Jewish community brought homemade chicken soup and toys to all the families on the floor (I received a coloring set). Although their altruism took just a handful of dollars, a few hours of time, and some kind words, I felt the tangible impact of their meaningful volunteer work. That kindness and the firsthand understanding of the power of service to others stays with me to this day.

Going on a tangent for a moment, the whole episode made me examine pneumonia and diseases in a whole new light. The World Health Organization estimates 450 million people are afflicted with pneumonia annually. Of those, 150 million are children and 1.6 million in that group will die. Even within developed countries, the mortality rate for those hospitalized is 12% and can reach 40% in severe cases. When I did the research following my hospitalization, it shocked me that the news of the day revolved around Saddam Hussein and less about this colossal killer of a disease. While I knew that pneumonia had been a terror in the days of yore, the ongoing magnitude of pneumonia was and is astonishing. I turned out to be a fortunate son of the U.S., but most people on our planet don’t have access to the kind of care I received.

My experience led me to recognize the importance in protecting the vulnerable denizens of third world countries. First in eradicating this and other diseases, and second through infrastructure that enables development from within. That infrastructure isn’t limited to civic buildings, but also higher education opportunities and a robust finance sector that can create liquidity and low-interest loans for entrepreneurs. In addition, while I didn’t fully grasp it at the time, the experience of coming so close to dying made me have an appreciation for life’s randomness in ways the other kids. When I finally returned to school, I pledged to myself to make the most of my time. I applied myself to my studies (well, not so much the religious ones) and tried to be more accommodating to friends.

As for the rest of the medical treatment, I wound end up staying 5 days in the hospital. Luckily for those immigrants I had read about and myself, scientist and Scotsman Alexander Fleming caught a fortuitous big break in the treatment of pneumonia. The development of penicillin had radically altered the casualty rate from pneumococcus (the bacterial pathogen that is transmitted between humans and causes the illness), with 80% successfully treated. Unfortunately, the primary delivery method and injection site has not changed since its inception. The oversize needle (pictured below) requires direct injection to the, erm, buttocks. The pain is tremendous, and the prolonged soreness has some comical effects.

I also had surgery that inserted a PICC line (peripherally inserted central catheter) which is a long-term IV line that leads directly to the heart. I was sequestered at home and had a multitude of antibiotics injected in me via the line. With the exception of a saline solution overdose and profuse bleeding/scarring when the PICC line was torn out (the scars are still on my right arm), the experience was uneventful and lonesome. During my time at home, I was exposed to an excess amount of daytime television; my repeated viewing of the show COPS may have been responsible for some street-wise slang that didn’t mesh in a yeshiva. Ultimately, the full recovery ended up taking months, and I had to leave school again when the pneumonia recurred in February. For good or bad, this experience was an integral part of my early life, playing a small role in shaping who I am today.

Penicillin needles

The fall of my junior year was a particularly mild season, filled with morning coffee and cigarettes on the steps of the Met and illicit walks through the park during lunch.  I spent my days engaged in high academia, challenging my intellect and shaping my morals through interpersonal relationships and experiences.  Afternoons were dedicated to extracurricular activities at school and later softball practices on Long Island.  I grew up pretty content in my relatively sheltered home, spending most of my time balancing my rigorous course load with sports under the expectation of my family that any free time would be spent working towards my goal of attending a prestigious university and playing Division I softball.  My nights, however, were soon to become a completely different story.

While other girls dreamt of sweet sixteens spent ice skating at Rockefeller Center or gorging themselves in an oversized ice cream sundae at Serendipity, I had only one goal in mind: to indulge in the reckless lifestyle of a young New Yorker.  I had always looked up to the upperclassmen who would cluster around the senior table in the basement of our Fifth Avenue mansion of a high school, poring over blurry pictures on digital cameras and recapping the events of the previous weekend between intermittent rages of laughter.  Their tales of debauchery seemed to be nothing but a pipe dream to me, a baby-faced fifteen year old with little pull in terms of getting parental permission to spend a night out on the town.  And then, one brisk night in late October 2004, everything changed.

After my birthday dinner at one of our favorite Mexican haunts, my best friends and I headed downtown into the uncharted waters of Greenwich Village, our eyes set on a sketchy basement clothing shop somewhere on MacDougal Street.  I looked both ways before entering the store, wondering what I would say if someone recognized me before being quickly ushered behind a rack of jackets and seated in a cold metal chair.  Thirty minutes and one hundred dollars later, I walked back out onto the street and lit a cigarette, exhaling a breath of smoke with a sigh of relief as we walked under the lights crosstown towards our next destination: Desmond’s Tavern.

Earlier in 2004, same-sex marriage had become legal in Massachusetts, a huge step in the country’s continuing battle towards equality and a bright moment for young liberals during the Bush administration.  The majority of my peers at the time were at the very least left wing leaning, though we functioned day in and day out under the strict law of an all-girls private Catholic establishment.  The administration did a very good job of monitoring the school-wide assemblies discussions, for the most part excluding LGBT issues from the board and making the legalization of same-sex marriage a hot topic of hushed discussion around school throughout the year.

My first successful trip to a legendary high school bar was one surrounded with a ton of emotion, much as the legalization inspired me and my borderline rebellious youth with whom I surrounded myself.  A nervous excitement mixed with the novelty of the respective situations, creating a sense of hope for the years to come as a thrilling adventure into unfamiliar territory had just begun.  The recognition of same-sex marriage was an affirmation in itself, as traditions were questioned and forward progress was made in our lives just as I “came of age” and began to learn more and more about the world that now lay at my fingertips.  These issues were a big deal to us at the time, as they both exemplified an acceptance into a new social circle that had been previously unattainable.

It was Friday, January 27, 2012, the day before my birthday. I was stuck at school, anxious for the day to be over so I can go and celebrate. But this was not only the day before my birthday. This year marked two years that my father has disappeared from my life. The reason to me was still unknown but at this point I had learned to accept it. Although, I already knew I would not be hearing from my father on my birthday, there still remained some hope and it burned inside of me.

There I was sitting in my lecture, occasionally dozing off. I looked at my phone to check the time and I see that I received a new e-mail. It stuck out in bold letters. The subject of the e-mail read, “My Retirement.” My stomach began turning as I felt the blood draining from my face. But there it was and inside that e-mail is some sort of writing that will bring all the emotions I was able to overcome right back to the table. I was not prepared for this day nor did I ever believe it would come. The day before my birthday? It could only mean that he wants to wish me the best. I hesitate to open this life changing experience. It was like opening back the door I had barricaded shut. His e-mail read:

“Well everything comes to an end, so this is my retirement in your life. I hold no remembrance of your nature. Goodbye and good luck.” His words could not have been more cold or hateful. They were sharp and straight to the point. They gripped my heart and ripped it into a million pieces. But I had to keep it together, especially in a lecture filled with more than 100 students. My next thought was to run out. And that I did. The only person I could think to call was my best friend, my mother. I could not bring the words to come out my mouth. I trembled and as I could finally form some sort of sound, I broke.

On July 27,  The 2012 Summer Olympics in London has begun. The olympics correlates with my story because these athletes train to be strong, to win, and mainly to lose. They accept when they have failed and continue to better themselves. Regardless of their win or their loss they remain a symbol in the eyes of millions that are watching. I could not let this e-mail bring me down, especially the day before my birthday.