Each morning the sun rises over the city’s skyline. It peeps up slowly, with every inch breathing a new light, a new day, into every creature. It’s bright they say, a ball of yellow fire high up in the azure sky. Fluffy white clouds are pasted every so often, contrasting the deep blue against the perfect eggshell white. The sun makes it way up slowly, climbing higher and higher. When it reaches its highest point, its full heat beating directly down on the world, the sun pauses to take  a quick look at the scenic surroundings from its high vantage point in the sky. Then it starts its way downward, sinking lower into the afternoon clouds. As the days settles to an end, the sun has almost disappeared from view. At this point the sky turns spectacular colors. Colors that seem out of place in nature, the deepest hues streak across the sky as if painted with a huge paintbrush. All the colors blend, brought together by the small wisps of white clouds still left in the evening sky. Just before the sun slips completely out of sight it pauses, again, seeming to want to take one last glance at the beautiful world filled with so many colors shapes and noises, before sinking behind the horizon, leaving the world in darkness. Night. That is my world.

Every person knows this. It’s just one of the regular miracles of nature that everyone takes for granted. I know this story just as well as the next person does; it’s been told to me time after time, but I've never seen it. Its up to my imagination to form the pictures in my mind. Each adjective holds so much meaning yet means nothing to me. The long description of the streaked sky at dawn is nothing more then a list of words. This is world as humanity sees it, but it’s not my world. My world consists of one thing. Darkness.
My name is Eva. I’ve never seen a star. I've never seen the moon, nor have I ever seen the city nights with all the lights sparkling up the dark. I never will. That is my world. It’s a fact, and it’s my reality. Facts can’t change reality, but accepting my reality might just change the facts.
  The sun’s rays sneak through my curtains, warming up my face, as if it wants to let me know it’s morning. My eyes flutter open, leaving me confused for a few seconds. Then as every morning, the swelling feeling of disappointment  in my chest, and the slow realization it was only a dream. Time to start another day. This one will pass just as the last one did, and the one before that, and the one before that. I survive each day one by one, living in almost in my own world although I’m surrounded by the real world constantly revolving.
Morning I've learned is a small, disguised blessing. Something that just comes, and no matter how much you shake the world, the sun will always rise. Day after day morning greeted with the same sights, sounds and smells, Regular routine doesn't phase the sun, it still comes back each day with the same strength as the day before. The chirping of birds, the fresh smell of coffee mixing with the brisk morning air, and the rumbling of lazy morning traffic making its way through the awakening city are just other blessings we take for granted.
In my world, I am the sun. Each of my planets faithfully revolve around me in perfect alignment. My mother absorbs my heat and my warmth, being my closest planet. She gets the wonderful breath of sunlight on my good days, and withstands my fiery heat on the bad ones. Her planet orbits in quick circles around me, faster and closer than any other. Somehow she gives me the support when those nights seem so long. My father is my constant guiding star, shining light on my forever dark path. Among these planets are many more, there’s cold unlivable planets showing the real world out there, with the harsh truth of reality. Few moons that I can count on the back of my hand, represent the few people I can always depend on at the end of the day. But by far the most important planet, the one the keeps me coming out each and every morning, is my imagination. It’s the farthest planet, making wide orbits around me, yet I know its always there. A world of its own where anything can be and nothing can change it except for the way my light shines on it. It’s a place where no one is hindered by a disability or weakness. In middle of all this, is me, the sun, always there never changing. Constant. Each of the objects in my galaxy orbit in perfect formation every day and night. Yet, things are shifting. Yes, planets are falling out of alignment.
  Once a little girl, pitiful to the merciless world, I was protected by my overly doting mother. Nothing was forced upon her little girl and she lived as a pampered princess. Every choice in my early life was no more a difficulty than choosing which flavor ice pop to eat, deciding based on how the color’s name rang in my ears. Everything was set up for me, and my loving parents were there for me every step of the way. They filled my dark world with unconditional love and light. That was my world as I had known it to be. But somewhere between my stage of a stumbling toddler to a thirteen year old girl, I realized things were starting to shift. I am being given independence, whether I want it or not. Frightening new choices are left up to me. My constant guiding light is now a little farther, a little dimmer, allowing their little girl to do a terrifying thing, to grow up.
I carefully pin up my hair in front of my huge floor to ceiling mirror, tucking that last stubborn strand behind my ear. I give my shirt one last hopeful tug, as if the wrinkles might just smooth themselves out. They don’t. I stare strait into the mirror at my own eyes. Deep breath, we’re gonna make this day a bright one, keep it together. One last glance at my face, and I walk out my door grinning slightly. Who am I kidding, getting dressed in front of a mirror.  Why its even in my room I'm not sure. My mother brushes it off as a mistake. I call it hope.
People think my world  must be a darker place. How could it not? A place where the sun rises and sets, except I don't know the difference. A place where its left to me, to roam free in a jail of my own mind. These might just be the facts, but I won’t allow it to be my reality. No one is allowed to make that decision except me.
I fumble for the doorknob. I grasp it, the metal cool against my sweaty palm. Turn to the left? No, twist to the right, and pull. Another small battle; another small blessing people take for granted. I stand in font of the open door. A gust of warm morning air knocks into me, as if wanting to welcome me outside. Wait.
I'm not ready yet, who knows what this day will hold for me?
I will do this, it’s not a big deal. I wont get stopped by my challenges, I can and will rise above.
No, but I can’t, this world is too big, with too many faceless, unnamed fears. I seem like a speck upon the universe, barely capable of walking out my own door.
No, I remind myself, I am the sun. This is my world and I will walk this battle.
Before my mind gives the final consent, my feet betray me, and here I am, over the threshold, exposed the world; on the front step. No turning back now, and so my feet mechanically move one in front of the other until I find myself walking along on the sidewalk on the bright sunny morning, leaves happily crunching beneath my feet.
Accepting the world I live in is an ever lasting battle. How can I stop wishing to understand the concept of a rainbow? Colors just arching across the sky, it seems surreal…seeing the happiness of a baby; the first toothless smile. The color blue. Ocean waves crashing onto the beach. My mothers face. Things so far out of my reality yet sometimes they seem close enough to grasp. Then there are the pitying looks I get where ever I go…No I can’t see their looks, but their eyes’ uncomfortable gaze on my own unfocused one is almost tangible. I hear their whispers. To them I am just a poor delicate girl who will never see her own pretty face. Yes, that is a fact but it’s not gonna be my reality. I wont allow it.
The hustle and bustle of the city is moving around me as I'm stand rooted in place. Huge buildings tower over the small pedestrians below. Cars are beeping, and sounds of a bus screeching  to a stop. I hear small children giggling as they trail behind their impatient mother. the sounds of baby bird chirping over the roaring sound of a plane overhead. So many people swarm around me, their gaze set strait ahead with a mission in their eyes. Each one of these people that jostle past has their own destination, and their own story to tell. I know I am just a number in the world out there, nothing more than one in many millions. But to me, in my reality, I am the world.
Each person is set apart by their differences, by their own struggles. It’s what makes us each different, and unique. My story is its own kind. It describes me, and my world. Mine is a story of hope and triumph, downfalls and struggles. It’s an unfinished story, without an ending. When will my story reach its final conclusion? The day where I fully accept my reality for what it is. I hope to one day see the sun rise, but until that day I will need to do all I can to make my own sunrise.