Who I am

         I felt that it would ease my mind a bit if I could explain a little bit about the person tap, tap, tapping away on this keyboard. Any good story starts at the begining, right?
         I was born August 7, 1986. Yes, I'll be 21 in a week. I consider myself young and I also consider this one of my downfalls. In my eyes I'll always be that twelve year old girl who felt akward around everyone and loved to be alone. I shy away from all confrontation even when my heart pumps for conflict. Anyway, I'm the youngest of three. My sister was born on Feburary 15, 1980 and that would make her 27 years old. My brother was born October 8, 1984 and that makes him 22 years old. I'd say I have a good relationship with my family but the fact remains that they know nothing about me. This may contribute to the problem I have with wanting to be a kid forever, the fact that my family still sees the twelve year old too.
         A strong fact is present in my family. The fact that we don't talk a lot about the past. This moment I can't remember when my parents were married, early seventies sometime. My father is 59 and my mother just turned 57 a few days ago. I don't remember much of my childhood. Just days of being a kid, playing around the neighborhood and getting into trouble that no one ever knew about. My parents weren't very watchful of us when we were young. Maybe it had something to do with being of the 'hippie' age or that they were just so absorbed in thier own lives, I don't know. The fact is that I felt ignored most of my childhood which probably led to my notion that to go at it alone was the best way.
         I found out later, due to the fact that I make a good snoop, that my father was married before he married my mother and that he had two daughters, twins actually. It was a bit of a surprise to me that I had two half sisters somewhere on this planet. I found it stranger that my family neither talked nor cared about it. Being the youngest always makes me wonder what my brother and sister know about that. My father served in the marines during the Vietnam era, he doesn't talk about it much. I do know, I believe my mother told me, that he never went over seas because he thought there was something in his file about last surviving son when he wasn't. He has a brother and a sister. He is the middle although I don't know who is the oldest. My aunt I believe. My father, I've been told, scored very high on math tests to get into the military and I think that may have been the reason he never saw battle. He doesn't talk about what he did for the country at that time but I think it had something to do with computers. Which I think must have been pretty important work at that time in history and that has something to do with his never seeing battle.
         I don't know what all this has to do with me but I figure that if I throw it all down on paper (or computer) that it may make some sense.
         I never knew three out of four grandparents. I never remember meeting my paternal grandfather before he died, lung cancer I believe. I vaugly remember the death of my paternal grandmother although I was very young. My maternal grandmother also died when I was very young and I remember less of her. My maternal grandfather is still living. He is in his mid ninties, 96 I believe. He lives in Connecticut and I only see him once a year. For being 75% italian we have a very small family. My mother's maiden name is Botticello, if you don't believe I'm italian. I know very little about who came over when and who was from where. Mostly northen italian I think.
         When I was very young I went to a catholic school that would best be described as a preperatory school. A rich school, I can't lie. I remeber the friends that I had and the games we played. We were creative kids. But the school was too expensive for my family and I went to a public school for a year before landing in the catholic school I stayed in until high school. I was in third grade when I went to the public school for a year. I remember that it was very different from the private school I had previously attented. The kids were different, the teachers, the building, it was all a bit overwhelming to me. A big memory I have from that year was that it was the year that OJ Simpson was on trial and that the teachers would let us watch bits of it on tv. I remeber the day that he was found not guilty and all the kids were so excited. I didn't really know why. I didn't know what the big deal was.
         When I first got to the catholic school I stayed in until high school I remember that I felt a bit behind. I had always been a smart kid who had no trouble with school but the switch from public to private school made me feel a bit inadequate, expecially in math. I couldn't do the times tables. I still have to count my fingers to do basic math. No one ever helped me and I wasn't that motivated to learn for myself. I always felt a little outside of all the other kids and the things they did always seemed funny to me. What I must have been to them makes me chuckle.
         Being an akward kid was fine with me for the two years that I was. My fourth and fifth grade year I was as much of the akward kid as you can get. I had no friends at school, I thought they were too stuck up for me. None of them lived in my neighborhood. They had thier big houses north of school while there were only a few of us that lived south of school. The only kid that lived in my neighborhood that I went to school with became my best friend. Around this time, between being the akward kid with no friends to a maladjusted kid with a best friend, was when my sister was crtically injured in a drive by shooting. It was in the summer after she graduated from high school, early August. I was going into sixth grade and had just turned twelve. I remember being awoken by my parents in the middle of the night. They said they were going to the hospital but that it was alright and to go back asleep. My memory becomes a bit full of holes here, I guess we only remember what we want to in rough times.
         My sister was shot on the left side of her head and was in a coma for two weeks or so. I remember cautiously taking a peak at that wound. It was covered, yet I was curious, and had a drain tucked in the skin. Her head was shaved bald. That was a bit unnerving for me because my sister had had the most beautiful long, brown hair that she occasionally streaked blonde. My sister was much better looking then me and she was much older. I don't know how to describe that feeling I had when I realized that the beautiful, independent teenager was gone and this was now my sister. I was twelve which means that I was just along for the ride. They didn't tell me all the details, in fact I don't remember anyone telling me anything. School started which meant that life had to roll on. My sister relearned how to talk, walk and write. She now writes with her left hand because she lost feeling in her right side. My sister had been a good artist, I don't know what her plans were for her future but they were certaintly abandoned now.
         It was hard, my parents spent thier time with my sister when she was in the hospital and then when she was in rehab or outpatient. Understandably so, but still something deteriorated. We, me and my brother, went to stay with a friend down the road for a bit and then my aunt and uncle that lived in town. I don't know who first and I don't know how long. We had two dogs at that time and I remember that the dogs and the house got a lack of attention which was why we had to go away from our house. Somehow children's services got thrown into the mix. The house had to be fixed up for us to return home. Carpet was pulled and walls were painted. I wasn't there for most of this so I don't know the whole story. My sister was over 18 and needed help doing things like showers and such so she stayed with my parents. We stayed with my aunt and uncle like I said and at random hotels or where ever you could find us. It's hard to remember much from that span of a year or two and I think that's what I regret most. That I can't tell the story accuratly because I don't remember much of it.
         I have one strong memory of that time, although I don't know when it happened. There was a children's service officer sitting at our kitchen table. She wanted to ask questions and I got angry and ran to my room. My mother talked me out and I had to sit there and be questioned. I felt like a common criminal and I didn't like it.
         My sister moved on quickly. She moved in with her boyfriend when she was 19 and had her son when she was 20, about a month before she turned 21 thats January 9th, actually. That would make her my age and for me to take on the responsibility of a child is incomprehensible to me. That's one of the reasons she such a hero to me, not to mention the brain injury. My sister is now married to that boyfriend and her son is now six. She doesn't work because she gets social security for her disabilities. I often wonder what she will do but only because it is so hard for me to understand being a stay at home mom. The police never made any arrests in my sister's case. We've had private detectives dive into it. My sister even knows who did it but there has never been any arrests. Her staute of limitations went up a few years ago. She lives in the neighborhood where she was shot and lives across the street from a guy that was there when she was shot. I think he knows who did it too. How's that for closure?
         Life goes on though, right? High school seems like one big blur for me. Just a few things happened that I think are worth mentioning. I was a freshman in high school, yes I feel young, when the planes hit the towers on 9/11. I was sitting in my italian class and I will never forget it. My Italian teacher was a bubbly younger woman who was always cracking jokes and having a good time. When the planes hit she turned on the tv and there was this frown, a look of worry on her face. That's what got me. I knew it was serious now. That same year, I don't remember how much later, I had Mrs Botti the latin teacher for homeroom. She yelled at the class when we wouldn't be quiet for homeroom anouncements. She yelled that this country was in war and that we should show respect and say the pledge. That was odd to me. I didn't think like that. No one did, we were kids. But she was right, we were in war. No matter what it felt like with life still going on and not affecting us one bit. There were people dying. I hoped I wasn't the only one who had got the message. Thanks, Mrs Botti. She's retired, by the way, and I wonder what she's doing now.
         I kept my head down in high school until my junior year. My best friend, the one from grade school, told me that I should join set crew with the drama club with him. He was a smart kid and had the ability to see things in me that I didn't see in myself. He once told me, when we were younger, that my stories were good and that I should write more. I had gone out on a limb and showed him one. Thanks, CJ. Cj and I had gotten together before high school, dated and gone farther then kids our age should. It's bitter sweet. I regret it but not with Cj because we were still friends after it. He was a good choice I guess. Back to junior year, I joined set crew with Cj and owe a lot to him for it. I had fun for once at school. Met other people and went to parties. It was a good time. Cj introduced me to his friend Joe and we became good friends right away. We were a lot alike. Joe liked to drink though, aslways braging about how long and how much he could drink. I thought it funny. I met a lot of different people and did a lot of different things my senior year of high school. Cj got kicked out of the catholic high school for making too much trouble (in short) and we drifted away a bit. I made plans to go to College in town, stay near home. I wanted to go to vet school, I still do I just think my chances are very slim.
         Backtracking a bit, I met a friend my freshman year of high school in ski club. I wanted to learn how to snowboard because I thought it looked like a lot of fun. We learned together and fun for the four years of high school. Her family was good to me, her mom a teacher at our high school. Senior year she dated Joe and changed a bit. She was one of those clingy girls it turns out and Joe only liked that he was wanted. I will admit, sometime in this period I got played like a fiddle. I wasn't interested in Joe, never have been too interested in boys, but he had a way of weedleing in that got me. I was played.
         Graduating high school is a big time for any kid. It's full of confusing and uncertainty. But I lived. I went off to college and learned next to nothing my fresman year. I met almost no one and was a bit shocked at the syestem. College was harder then I had thought it would be. Not just academically but systematically. I had a good job that I still have now. That was about all I did, bury myself in my work.
         My sophmore year I learned ten times more. Maybe it's that I've started to finally grow up a bit or that I opened up more and met more people. It seems that the more people you met, the more diversity you know or recognize, the more you learn. One of the things I'm still having trouble with is that people seem to see things in me before I see it in myself. I recently learned that if you make the people around you happy then that is all you can do. The rest will follow.
         The problem is this still hasn't led me to answer my question. Who am I? Currently I am a student, snowboarder, friend, daughter, sister, aunt, granddaughter, animal lover, outdoorsman, handyman, fix-it-upper, calm, cool and collected. I am a thinker, a lover, a peacemaker and a pacifist. I try to be an activist and ally for diversity. Call me a dirty liberal if you must, thanks Wes. Someone who never knew me taught me to always remain humble and to always live in graditude. And how to laugh in the face of sadness, thanks Mike.