While some see life as a metaphor, something that belongs to them, to adorn, I feel blinded. I’m the type of person who sits there, rubbing her eyes, seeing all the shapes and colors within the dark abyss of her eyelids. I see myself as an old monk with crystal-hazed eyes on a journey to find a question that is waiting to be answered.

I’ve spent all my life within the streets of San Diego. I was in and out of apartments, houses, even a spare back room of a family friend’s abode. I’ve never had a place I could call home. My father is a voice through a telephone and money within my mother’s pocket. My sisters have left to write new chapters in their books, and my mother is busy working to support the two of us.

My favorite part of my day is coming home, sitting on the couch, and listening to music as I close my eyes and wish for the past. Not the future like most friends my age, but the past.

I wish for a complete family again. Movie nights in a big living room, eating dinner at the same time, sharing laughs. I wish for laying on my mother’s lap as she plays The Legend of Zelda, falling asleep to the sweet music drifting from the television speakers. I wish for gripping onto my fathers’ old flannel, rubbing my small, frail face against the soft red fibers to avoid being washed away within the crowds of Comic-Con.

I wish for my past.
I open my eyes, and all I can see is the future. As I sit among a class of my peers, I’m afraid this, too, will soon become a memory. This school is my sanctuary. The school is my community. This is the place I have learned to call home.

During the end of fourth grade, my mother found a job as a janitor at Explorer Elementary. It took a few months to adjust, and a year to fall in love with the community--and the place I fell in love was the library. Because my mom worked so late, I found myself here every night, to the point where I would just fall asleep. I’ve never felt such ease within the walls of a school.

So after fifth grade, I chose to go to the middle school right upstairs. This is where my true journey began. This was my first time participating in project-based learning. I could craft each project to my liking while working with other students.

Just as I was becoming assimilated into my new home, some of my peers felt like intruders. I was shunned, excluded, even bullied  by those around me. Everyday after school, I would run down the steps like Cinderella once the clock struck 3:30, and wallow away within the walls of my safe haven--my old elementary school. I would, once again, close my eyes and wish for the past, but all I could hear was the future haunting me. To complicate things further, my mother divorced, I repeated the seventh grade, and puberty was the cherry on top.

At the end eighth grade, as I sat outside of the school late one night, I began to wish with open eyes. I thought of how resilient my mom had become since leaving my dad, and I related it back to my own suffering.  Finally I went home, then woke up the next day with a mended heart. Once it was time to choose a neighboring high school, I thought to myself, I have to learn to let go, to explore, and see the world around me.

Unfortunately, my mother chose Texas. Though I tried to adjust, I couldn’t. This resulted in me standing up to my mother and insisting on returning to the school I’d grown to love. Once I was back in the beloved world I’d created for myself, the water was set and all that was left was for the seed to grow. I discovered my love for writing towards the end of my freshman year. Since then, I’ve written storyboards, vignettes, poems, business letters, essays, sidebars, and creative writing pieces. I was praised for my efforts and learned to respect the process of revision. My writing is like a rock that holds a precious gem inside: the more I polish, the I reveal.

Alas, now is time I must learn to let go. If I had the chance to go back and relive my journey, I would. Some people say “Home is where the heart is,” and leaving your home leaves a bittersweet taste upon your tongue. This is my reality as I face graduation. After ten years at my school, I wouldn’t mind going back and doing it again.

This time, with eyes wide open.