Rachel Heads West (an introduction)

It was the spring of 1994 when a 7 year old Rachel Torres had to say goodbye to her childhood home.
                   
She had been born and raised in Boston, Massachusetts. It was all she had ever known. It was the only city in the world that mattered, so far as her still developing mind knew, yet here she stood, alongside her three little brothers, waving farewell to their home as their mother loaded up the last of their personal belongings into the car.
                   
Mother Torres had arranged for her family to move out west in the hopes of realizing her dreams as an aspiring film director. She visualized herself catapulting into the stratosphere among the greats like Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, or Frank Capra. Her fantasies of the Hollywood high life that she had envisioned for some time now were a prevalent dream weighted down only by the four children accompanying her. There was a sense of guilt for the small lives she was uprooting, but it was always glossed over by her reasoning that the move would be, in the long run, of more benefit to them than to herself.  Whether or not she truly believed that is debatable to this day, but it served the purpose at the time in allaying her concerns.
                   
Thirteen years later and Mother Torres’ dream of making it big as a film director is now a faded pursuit fallen to ruin. She finds that she is no longer in the business of trivial pursuits. To dream big, she once believed, was to aim high. To aim high, she now believes, is to fail to reach that which is out of reach. Furthermore, she now discovers that she is no longer the star of the story. The focus has shifted. The spotlight now shines on a new player, her oldest child and only daughter, Rachel.
                   
Rachel Torres is now 24 years old and a young woman. The spitting image of her mother. She is now, herself, a mother of two children.  Yet like so many of her generation, she is not married but keeps a close relationship with the father of her children. She finds that her family, once a bit distant from one another, has now become a much closer since the death of her youngest brother two years ago. Also, she has noticed her mother’s increasing insistence on establishing a bond with her two grandchildren, which suits Rachel just fine.
                   
Rachel’s name is unusual in that it is spelled the exact way as “Rachel” but pronounced “Raquel”. She has enrolled in school to better herself and decided to become a Communications major. Although what she will do with such a degree she hasn’t the slightest clue. What Rachel isn’t so clueless about is the fact that she knows how much she loves to write. She’ll often times find herself pouring into a journal or whipping up a page or two of a fictional novel that could be inspired by her own life. She has discovered through practice that her writing is usually done at random, meaning whenever she feels the urge or inspiration to do so. But she longs to quit that form of practice and to find ways to channel her talent and focus in a more efficient manner. This is why she has enrolled in a Creative Writing Class.
                   
If you were to ask Rachel what she values about herself, she would most likely respond in high praise of her creative mind, her thoughtful nature, and her keen perceptions on life. She enjoys that fact that she is a people person and might boast that she is rather good with children and the elderly.
                   
If you were to ask Rachel what she detests about herself, then you’d have to take a seat as she whips out a list in order to describe to you the faults she has pinpointed about herself. She claims she is bad at math, but shows no real apology for it. She detests her laziness which often deters her from pursuing the things in life that she wishes to achieve.
                   
Most of all, she finds fault in the fact that despite enjoying the company of others, she finds that she has a limited circle of close friends. And it is not because people don’t like her or that she does not like other people, but simply that she continually feels a disconnect among those her own age. One would assume that the reasoning for this is because, by today’s standards, she has had children rather young in her life. And although this does add some difference in the way she perceives herself in life, she claims that that is not the sole reason for her disconnect. The answer is simply that Rachel finds most people of her generation to be stuck in a rather pointless situation. Many people of her generation live for the party  and work solely to afford that kind of materialistic lifestyle. Rachel has found herself to be removed from that way of life.
                   
Rachel is very laid back as a person and prefers to connect with her herself through self-reflection. She enjoys reading and finds an evening with a good book preferable to a night out on the town. One of her favorite books being To Kill A Mocking Bird.          

Rachel has become the star player of her own story by not pursuing a fantasy of herself, like so many are prone to do, but my simply seeing herself for who and what she really is and enjoying the company of the person she has come to be.