I would overshare to whichever unfortunate employee had to ring me through at the store, and could never shake the sense of disparity I felt deep in my chest. I grew older faster than I could keep track of, and soon Frank had moved out to Colorado to pursue his education. He wasn’t interested in staying connected with me, no matter how hard I tried, and his visits home for the week of Christmas were quiet and uneventful. As the years went on and he started into his career path, his week at home grew shorter and shorter, until all I could count on was a phone call Christmas morning, which lasted all of about two minutes. Henry was unaffected by the lack of his son’s presence, and this caused me to feel even lonelier as I was bewildered by his lack of interest in both his son and his wife’s lives. And now here I am, seventy eight years old, a widow, silently trapped in my own mind, unable to escape and living off the machine that breathed for me. The hospital room is empty, except for a small hanging calendar and a chair pushed into the corner, the sounds of the machines echo rhythmically, although the room was small it sounded like a…
Days and nights would pass by with Barbara unable to spot any difference in between. The routine had been formed; she’d wake up, go to work, visit the elderly house, return home to sleep. Repeat. Barbara at the age of 30 was worn out and exhausted. Her mother’s death had scarred her deeply, her children hated her and her husband had left her for some woman he had found at some bar.…
When it comes to playing the proverbial, "game," even Einstein knew that knowing the rules was not enough. I believe that in order to truly succeed in any endeavor, one has to apply their knowledge practically, be willing take risks, and operate proactively. Fortunately, I have always had a predisposition to learn with dexterity, so the rules have never been an obstacle for me. Playing the game, however, can potentially be challenging.…
Gone was the quick, flashing eye that irritated my sensibilities and quickened my heart when we were younger. Her beauty had faded into a shadow of her brilliance during those winter nights in society. That evening on the hallowed grounds of our meeting place, she picked her steps slowly, content to leave her hand in mine. Her gaze was melancholy, solemn. They were worldly eyes. They had seen a darker side of existence.…
My father had disappeared before my birth, and my mother never mentioned a single thing about him. Whenever she mentioned him, she did so out of spite and resentment. My mother and I lived happily together, singing and laughing at the things Grover’s Corners had for us. As I grew up, however, my mother changed from the sweet, kind person I had known to a cynical old woman who smoked cigarettes constantly. The mother I used to sing church hymns with had long disappeared, replaced by a vicious woman who considered her son as nothing more than a hindrance.…
Though no idea of how this relates to the audience, the teachers, comes to mind, this speech by James Baldwin gave me some ideals to contemplate. It recounted the horrors that the American “way of life” afflicted the African American populous. Furthermore, Baldwin connects the American “way of life” to how “it is the American white man who has long since lost his grip on reality.”(p.128) Truly, this is not a speech intended for school teachers, but an explanation of how racism forced children to believe the lies; the lies about their humanity.…
Tattoos are permanent symbols that last forever, while relationships can’t be guaranteed permanent now a days. Kim Addonizio chooses tattoos as a symbol in this poem “First poem for you.” Water and lightning is what makes the poem most symbolistic. “Lines of lightning pulsing just above your nipple can find as if by instinct the blue swirls of water on your shoulder where a serpent twists facing a dragon.” Though symbols can have more than one meaning to them the poem helps to point of the specific meaning of these symbols.…
She thinks of all the passed years, all the years belonging to that foreign girl that she once, all drifting only further away, as if she had never even existed. She could no longer recall all of what she had done in her flaming youth, in her years of romance and teenage angst, she didn’t remember the coffee shop lunches or her ventures in friendship and betrayal. She couldn't even remember the names of her closest friends in high school or her first boyfriend- how inseparable they had once been and how now they meant nothing-. When she closed her eyes she could see her mother's eyes, her aged eyes, the ones that had seen so much, and knew that her eyes held the same desperate…
All that nervous energy that bounced in him, slammed his heart into his chest, kicked him in his stomach and fried his nerves was all gone and he felt incredibly hollow. Now his face itched from being held in a certain position and his lungs fluttered when they finally expanded. His ribcage was gone and his heart was reluctantly easing itself back to it’s normal pace. He stretched his fingers before him and considered, that maybe, maybe he was overreacting over a crush, but it was L of all people, so he stewed in it. He continued on alone, but didn't feel like walking, so he sat down before one of the films that allowed the survivors to tell their stories during the Holocaust. He half listened half pitter-pattered on his phone until someone sat close to him, he scooted over. Then he felt a very small tap on his arm. He looked up and found a faceless young woman holding this baby, this gorgeous, fat, wide eyed baby. Dark eyes, soft dark skin, and smooth curly hair. The baby gave him a gummy smile and tapped on his shoulder…
Joan Didion is one of America’s iconic writers. In her powerful book, “The Year of Magical Thinking”, she portrays the story of how her only daughter Quintana, just days before Christmas in 2003, was taken ill, put in an induced coma and placed on life support. A matter of days later, her husband John, suffered a massive and fatal coronary. Didion asserts, “This is my attempt to make sense of the period that followed, weeks and then months that cut loose any fixed idea I had ever had about death, about illness ….. about the ways in which people do and do not deal with the fact that life ends, about the shallowness of sanity, about life itself” (pg 7, 2005).…
Thinking of my childhood brings back memories of sunny weather, the crisp, fresh Georgia air, and the smell of freshly cut grass near the local baseball fields. I have always looked back upon my childhood as the happiest days of my life. What did I really need to worry about? There was always food on the table, and I was surrounded by the people I loved. In the novel, Crooked Little Heart, Rosie is depicted as a dramatic teenage girl who has lost many people in her life; Rosie’s actions remind me of the last time I visited my great-grandmother.…
What they look like on the outside and not what they are on the inside. The librarian behind the counter scanning books was always bored and strict. The friend who always smiled and was outgoing never had insecurities or difficulties to deal with. Never did I think that the librarian may have been adventure seeking hiker or that my friend experienced anxiety in every social setting with more than two people. A child’s mental capacity for thinking only took me to analyze the first layer of the person’s character. My mother’s diary changed everything for me. Although I came to realize that people did not have one characteristic as I grew, my mother’s words threw this understanding at me and forced it down my throat. It caused me to experience firsthand how ignorant I was, how uncaring I was of my own family. Here I was, sitting on the comfortable, plush couch complaining about cleaning, when my mother suffered every day at the nursing home cleaning after the…
The tough times of latter years had wrinkled the skin on his face, yet the old green eyes affectionately gleamed about the times ahead. He gazed intently at his gnarled hands which persistently provided reminiscence of the past. His aches were his constant companions, not friends, but always with him. His voice was slow as he stumbled upon words at times. But often he was overwhelmed by emotions that had been buried for decades. These emotions, however were destroyed in an instant.…
She sat around indulging herself in cigarette after cigarette, even knowing the consequences that would soon follow. Lung diseases threatened her life and a belt was forcibly tied around her lungs as nicotine filled half of the air that she breathed during every breath. What’s the point of existence with an incurable disease known as depression? She tossed her happiness into an endless pit almost giving up in the process, but, she realized that she had another chance. Two in-fact, not knowing that grief would overtake the emotions that had once existed in happiness. Body bags and stretchers still fill her emotions to this day as she lays restless in her…
The dreadful events of the day began to fade from my mind as I began focusing on every minute movement, questioning the purpose behind the machines rapidly being attached to my grandfather’s chest. While working on my grandfather, the doctor explained how the electrocardiogram worked he was planning on performing, showing me the rhythms of my grandfather’s heartbeat. I watched as the electrocardiogram traced each beat, following the line with my eyes, unable to tear myself away from the medicine as I felt an enigmatic connection to the hospital. Entranced by the slow, smooth beat of the heart, I fell in love. The images became woven into my mind, removing a lock from my brain that I never knew existed. For the next week and a half, I sat by my grandfather’s bedside throughout the entire day, absorbing new information. When the doctors would enter the room, I would listen intently to each word that came out of their mouth. Freed from the lock created by a lack of awareness, but placed in the grips of a passion that captivates my mind. I spent days in the hospital, yet I felt as though I was there for but a minute. As I adopted the ideas into my knowledge, I felt undiscovered emotions of infatuation that I never want to…