There are a lot of things that makes a person who they are.
I do a lot of things for many reasons, I do not know if I am more broken than
most but at 23, I have been through more than most. I have had to totally
rebuild my life and start over more times than I could possibly count, before I
was an adult even. While going through a box of my things, school paper work
and such, I found two old report cards, and I think they were put in the envelope
together to show me something, a tragedy in my life, but a lesson, I have yet
to recover from.
I was a good student in school my entire life, things like
that just came natural to me. I didn’t have to study, but I always did my
homework, I realized later that I just didn’t want to let anyone down, it wasn’t
about the attention, which I got because of all the awards I got in elementary
school and middle school. I was on a fast track and the world was at my feet,
at the beginning junior year of high school, I was going to a member of the
National Honor Society, graduate with honors, get a lot of scholarships and maybe
even become the Valedictorian, those were the goals I had. That was not the
results I got, however, sitting in my seat at Senior graduation, I was only
walking, I had not in fact graduated (which made me last in the class I
suppose) , I had only one scholarship, and I had zero honors. What changed in a
year and a half? Everything.
My grade cards I sat the other night and stared at the end
of my sophomore year with a 3.7 and the first half of my junior year with a 3.1
and it only dropped from there. I saw them and threw them in disgust. The next
morning on my time travel app my Facebook reminded me WHY those changes
happened and I have to ask after I say it, why I almost didn’t graduate, what
would you choose?
Around this time, 6 years ago, I made a huge choice. I left
high school for two weeks, it was not a long time, but it was enough to fail me
in two classes because it put me so far behind, and I barely passed the others.
My Grandfather was dying.
The man that raised me, I looked up to him for everything, I
was his sunshine, If I ever wanted anything, I knew if he could, he would get
it for me, he wanted me to have everything he could afford or give me any
experience I wanted. We were so a like in so many ways, and I get a lot of my
traits from him, my love of history and camping, my ability to tell a story, my
temper, that’s all him.
When I was sixteen he was diagnosed with cancer, it started
with a patch of skin cancer on his back and in two years was everywhere. My
sophomore year of high school was filled with nothing but doctors’
appointments, various doctors, almost every day. I watched this man that had
been so strong and stubborn go through chemo and radiation, become so weak he
could barely walk, was afraid to do the things he loved, he went in and out of
the hospital all the time. I spent most of that summer at summer camp because I
didn’t know how to handle it, I hated seeing him like that, and there was
nothing I could do to help it.
The last time I saw my grandfather going into a hospital was
in late August 2008 as he was being wheeled on a bed he cried and said he didn’t
want to go back, he didn’t want to do it anymore.
I was going to school
and driving to the hospital at night to spend the night at my grandfather’s
side because each night they weren’t sure, it could have been his last. I
finally broke down, I was tired of not sleeping right, going to school and
every time they came on the PA system I prayed they didn’t call me down to the
office to tell me that my grandfather was gone , so I asked my grandma, “What
do I do?”, I had missed so much school as it was and she just looked at me and
shook her head, “What you think you need to.” It was one of the first times she
had treated me as an adult, I was only sixteen.
I chose to be by grandpa’s side. Even after he couldn’t remember anyone, he
remembered me, he couldn’t remember the love of his life, but he remembered his
granddaughter. He even remembered to tell me ‘Happy Birthday’ and that was one
of the last things he ever said to me.
Four days later, he took his last breath and the cancer took
him from us.
My grades never recovered. I was lost in grief for a long
time, and maybe I still am, I still cry as I write this. I lost myself so
badly, I did many things to try and get rid of that pain.
I like to think I found out an important lesson, one that I
may need to “unlearn” if I ever want to be a good student again, but I learned
that sometimes, what you think is important in life, is not. There was
something more than school. My life had been all about it until that time,
school came first, but in this time it didn’t. I cared more about my
grandfather, I may not have known at the time all I was giving up, I knew it
wasn’t going to be pretty, but I knew it would be worth it. Every birthday I
imagine him smiling and telling me ‘Happy Birthday Seetheart’ (it’s what he
always called me), that memory alone was worth it.
Ever since that time in my life my outlook has been jaded. I
thought being with my friends was more important than an A on a test or quiz ,
and going out was more important than finishing a paper. Maybe I was wrong, but
am I? An education is important but so is friendship and being happy. Someday,
I will finish my education, and I do hope to get good grades but I will never
lose sight of that lesson, that you need to make memories and be happy and it
comes down to some tough decisions. So what will you choose?
If
you feel like you would like to share your experience with me or have
something you would like me to talk about in the blog email me at:
a_song4hope1123@yahoo.com
God Bless
- Adriene Song
God Bless
- Adriene Song
