I was going through what seemed an endless stack of photos debating what to keep and what not to keep when my Grandfather (whom I affectionately call "Poppy") appeared in the door way. "Why don't you grab yourself a cold one and meet me outside?" he said. I stood up, some what surprised, some what not, as I felt I had been expecting this. To me, "grabbing a cold one" might have been something he would have said to my Mom (if she had still been with us), or perhaps it was in turn acknoweleging me as an adult. Either way, I headed down stairs and made myself a nice large ice tea, in the big green cups that I had used almost 5 years ago when I had still lived there.

I headed out side into the hot Louisiana heat and standing on the porch had to laugh at myself as I realized Poppy had purposely sat in the middle of the 3 fold up camping chairs, rather then sitting on one end probablly knowing I would have choosen the other. "Have a seat, might as well make yourself comfortable." he said. I laughed nervously and asked "What, am I in trouble?" He shook his head, "No, No. But I want to talk to you about something."

This was it. I knew it. The talk. The talk we probablly should have had some 10 years before, maybe the talk I was scared I'd never get the chance to have, yet equally afraid of duing to the fact I knew it would stir deep emotions. It was important, it was Big to me in a way as you the reader might not understand as of yet. I tried to keep myself in the present, I wanted to take every detail in and not forget a word. I noticed the white camper behind him, the wind blowing very softly in the trees as if I was watching an HD film, and the brim of his straw cowboy hat. My mind and body seemed to be racing with in itself, making it difficult to take everything in that I wanted.

He started very slow and steadily, "Very few people will ever know, or be able to understand everything you've been through. Your Grandma and I have personally witnessed all the Hell you've struggled through. I want to tell you that I'm very proud of you and everything you've accomplished"

My grandfather was a writer and a very eloquent speaker. I took the moment of awkward silence to have a nervous sip of my tea followed by a hard gulp, knowing he was only in the introduction of what must have been a very thought through speech.

"You probablly don't remember this, but the first time you lived with us you were a small baby. Grandma Pam had you on a schedule with napping and eating and everything. She was really just heart broken when she had to give you back and your mother took you away. The following years you were back in forth with us, like the time we had gotten a call from a bartender and you were wandering around Bourbon Street at night when you were 3. When you came to live with us again, it was like you didn't even remember us and we were perfect strangers to you. (very true I thought...I remember that day) I can't even imagine how rough it must have been for you and all that you had already experienced by that age.Your Grandma and I had did our best in what we thought were for your best interests. No wonder you acted out so much towards us back then."

"God, I was seriously a monster back then. I don't even know why" I said.( I really was..I used to have such bad fits and tempertantrums my aunts distinctly remember comparing me to the exorcist except for the fact my head didn't spin around. I kicked, spit, hit, screamed and would purposly throw up on them.)

"No, we just wanted you to be happy, we thought maybe they could deal with you better if you were in a structured family. But if I would have ever have known what was going to happen to you when we sent you to live with Liz and Rick, we would have never have let you go. And if I could go back and change it, I would."

"Poppy," I said still processing his apology with all that I had learned from my life and both taking and not taking things not for granted. "No one could have known.You shouldn't think about the past like that.You can't go back, and you'll only drive yourself crazy thinking of what should have been and what could have been." I said. My voice sounded nervous, and my nose begin to run with the tears I was holding back.

"Well I still would if I could. If we had any idea..." He went off. 

"Yeah, but I wouldn't be who I am today if it wasn't for all that."  I stated finally looking off into the front lawn trying to be positive. I was noticing that it was a normally warm but beautiful day in June and I could hear the once familiar locuses chirping high in the trees. "I too have thought of things I could have done differently, if I could go back and change things. Even with stuff like my Mom".

"That's besides the point" He said. "I know it wasn't very easy living with me, especially after your mother died. It took a real toll on me, which I don't know if you ever noticed. Those times were really hard on us all."

I reflected back on the memories, knowing that I had stored most of the thoughts and emotions of my mother dying, and the fact that she had practically abandonned me up till then, in the back of my mind. It was easier to pretend like it never happened, like it was some one I didn't even know. Perhaps it was because at the age of 13 I wasn't able to process it enough to deal with it. Or the fact that, because I didn't think of it all, more emotions, questions, and pain really festered up inside of me and my unconciousness. To me it was the common senario of the kid who was supposed to clean up his room but threw everything in his closet instead because he didn't want to, or just plain couldn't deal with it. Eventually the closet got so full and over piled that when he opens it just a crack to add one more thing, the whole thing comes piling down on him at once. In my state of well...let's call it purposefull ignorance, I had never really considered the affect it had on my Grandpa. I heard about it, how my cousins would tell me it was because I looked so much like my mom and reminded him of her, how other's were affected in my family, but I don't think ever really understood till this moment either. I shared a very different loss, as they actually knew her as a person, and I felt I had never really got the chance.

"Yeah, "I replied. "I don't really understand it all. Why she left me, why she did what she did. Some times I have questions about things".

"I have alot of questions too. Some I wish I had the answers to and some I probablly wouldn't want or like" he said. "I know you remember the time I told you that I loved you only because I was obligated to and not because of who you were."

I nodded. "yeah".

"I'm very sorry that I said that to you. I want you to know how proud we are of you, living in a different country, doing all these different things. We really like Christian, and I am very happy for the two of you. I think the charity thing with the orphans is a really great idea. I really do."

"Thank you Poppy" I said. And I meant it. It was a thank you for the talk, our first real talk, and for all those years that I could never see from his point of view but that he took care of me none the less. Just then I saw my grandmother's white Nissan pull up in the drive way. I could feel my cheeks were flushed and quite hot. I gave Poppy a quick hug, still taking in every moment and detail I could. I felt a lump on his back, and how frail his body was. I was happy for the talk, and happy it was over with some closure. I had a date night to get ready for. I was supposed to have dinner and a movie with him and I didn't want to be running late so I headed inside too the cool airconditioning. I was only half way up the stairs when it all started coming out. Just sobs and tears, and everything I had held back almost emotionless for the talk. Chris came in behind me and asked me if I was ok. "Yes" I replied. "We just had a really good talk, and Poppy apologized over alot of things. I'm just a bit emotional."

"Well that's a good thing right?" he asked.

"Yeah it's a good thing" I said.

Chris told me he would wait out side for me while I got ready. Suprisingly it was right after that talk that I learned that he asked my Grandfather for his permission to marry me. The thought had popped in my mind breifly when the conversation had started, thinking perhaps that's why but I knew they were much more serious matters to address and I had pushed it way out of my mind. I knew that night was going to be a fun date night, but I never expected him to propose to me and so much it one day. Then again, that's another story you'll have to stay tuned for. It really felt like putting a divider in a book seperating Part One from Part Two.

Except this book, is the story of my Life from my eyes.

Please feel free to share! I feel so blessed not to have Caterplexy. I'd love to hear your experience with Narcolepsy- how long you've dealt with it and how you've dealt with it best.

Today, is the last day that I'll be 22 yrs old.

22 long years that have flown by like mere days on a summer's breeze and all I have to show for it are quite a few grey hairs, some skin spots and wrinkles. Yes, that's right. I'm 22 and I have wrinkles.

So, on my last day of being 22 I think I'd like to make a record of a few things that have been on my mind lately. Perhaps I'll look back on this very blog 20 years from now in wonder of how much I've grown, perhaps not. And perhaps I won't live another 20 years, so here it goes:

Ever since I can remember as a child, I held all the world with such wonder in my eyes. I was so confident that I was bound for greatness of the best kind. The kind, of helping others and making a noticable difference. I rambled on and on to who ever would listen about the adventures I'd go on. When I was 4 I was bound for Egypt, and South Africa. The Great ruins of Greece and the people of China were beckoning my name. I lived to read 1974 copies of National Geographic dreaming that one day I would get the chance to see the things they got to see.

The other thing I've thought about constantly for as long as I can remember is Death. I remember being awake at night when I 5 years old holding a knife fantasizing about stabbing myself in the stomach to make them all sorry. As I got older I had many misconceptions about death as if it were a made up TV/Movie special effect. By the time I was 13 I had made up my mind that I'd be willing to sacrifice my life inorder to save others, even if they never knew it. By the time I was 16, the world felt like just to much and I wanted nothing more than to die. It all seemed so pointless and life just felt so numb. When i was 18 it was the least of my worries as I was convinced that when I died, I'd be going to a way better place- so it wasn't on my mind as much. Then a couple of years ago, my friend Louis wrote a blog about how one day, we're all going to die. Well that's a duh kind of statement, but then it hit me. I will cease to exist any longer. Suddenly, every breath I breathed just didn't seem to have enough air. There weren't as many hours in a day, and every single night I lay awake thinking of the day it will happen. I am plagued with paralyzing thoughts, inescapable as I try to rest my mind on my pillow.

Wondering what my last thought will be when I die.

Will I be ready to die? Will I ever be ready- is anyone really?

"This is your life, are you who you want to be?"
A great song by Switchfoot, it still holds true to me today but with different meaning. To me, it means this is your only life- the only chance you get. Are you happy with yourself? Will you be remembered as you'd like when you're gone?

I used to be Christian. I say "used to" because there are no churches in Amsterdam I can attend. There is no fellowship for me here. Many would claim there is no God here. I would never claim that. But I don't read my Bible as much anymore. The words fall empty and hollow- the morals are basic and true. I question if God is a person, is He of substance or of ecsence? Is he a life force, basic carbon, or our imagination?

I read the series other wise known as " the Golden Compass". As wish Harry Potter Radical Christians had a hay day with the series so I decided to read it for myself. I understand what many of them were upset about. The series claimed God was a fake- just the first piece of consciousness to realize itself and so he lied to the other beings of consciousness that he was their creator. I hated the obvious discrimination to Christian beliefs and the fact that they wanted to " kill God". It won the Nobel award for " young minds" which I thought was dreadful, because young minds are so easily cultivated. While the end result of the book was that when you die, you simply dissolve into dust, rejoining the rest of the Universe, it can be so damaging to young minds to have nothing to look forward to in the end.

It's my biggest Fear in Life.

To go into the darkness, the unknown to find that there is nothing there. It all goes black. I cease to think, to exist, to just be. I'm scarred to death of dying- but what choice do any of us have?

I am even more scarred of not getting the chance to live the life I always dreamed. To have adventures and a family of my own. To leave behind a legacy and to make the world just a little brighter of a place than when I first came into it.

 

Tomorrow, I will have lived 23 years.

I have no career, no car, no plans. I haven't gotten the chance to go to school-and if I still lived in the US it's guaranteed I'd be something screwed on health insurance. At the Average Life span of an American- I'm already 1/4 though my life span.

I hope to get married to the man I love the most, have a few children, be close to the people I care most about and perhaps some day realize what on earth I'm here for. Guess I can join the ranks of the other 7 billion people on this earth trying to figure out the same thing. I am so blessed. I can only imagine what it must be like to be an orphan, a victim of war or of a disaster. I can only imagine the questions they must ask and the fears they must face. My hope is to inspire hope in those. To do what I can for those people- so perhaps they too, will get the chance to try and figure out what they're here for and what they're meant to do with the precious time they get.