I Figured It Out,

How to get what's in my head to go down to my fingers and on to this computer screen.

On Wednesday night I met at a restaurant to attend a going away party for one of my most influential teachers. This teacher has the most approachable attitude of any teacher I've ever had and has shown me how to expand my writing, how to dig deeper, how to make my writing something that it never could have been before I met him.

I wasn't going to go. I had just worked my second eleven hour day in a row at work, I was sun burnt, tired, and in my work clothes. Plus, I had Emily with me. Normally, not a problem. But this is a big hippie town with big hippie tendencies and I didn't know if a group of students sitting around a place that has one of my favorite beers and amazing food was the place to bring her. I didn't know if this group of people who are mostly unaware of anything beyond the orbit of their own personal lives was a group that I wanted to expose my attention-whore daughter to.

But then I went anyway. And I brought Emily. I was planning on staying only long enough to drop off a card I had bought for the teacher, to say hi to the few people I knew, and then to leave. Instead, the people I knew were the first ones to show up. The unpretentious, aware people were there. Later more people showed up with obvious tattoos and perfectly placed piercings and I got a little uncomfortable because honestly, I usually do. I'm twenty-two years old. I have a three-year-old. Most people have absolutely no grasp on this situation and the looks I get are not looks I want my daughter seeing people give to me. I don't want her to ever think that she's weird, or that her mother fucked up and got pregnant too young. I try to avoid those looks.

I also have this confrontational problem. I'm not very good at letting things be. So, when I get looks like that, it usually ends incredibly uncomfortably for whoever shot the look in the first place.

Anyway. The restaurant we were waiting at was being snooty and the party had grown to twenty people. I was getting ready to leave when everyone made the joint decision to go to the pizza place instead. Emily was OHMYGODSTARVINNNNNGGGGGUUUUUH so we went with. My intention was only to grab her some pizza and go. I don't often like discussing details of my life with people who can't empathise. It's very hard for me to explain why I do what I do and why I do things the way I do them to people without responsibilities beyond their own lives. It's hard for me to explain why I had to "take a semester off" when, really, I HATE this semester off. I miss school and I feel like my brain is turning in to mush. I just couldn't afford it. At all. So I had no other option. I haven't kept in touch because I work a full time job and have to raise a three year old and have a house to keep clean-ish and a relationship that means the world to me and other interests and a lot of family issues right now. People just don't understand all of this. (I guess I could just start lying, start complying with the small talk, but I hate that. I really do.)

It's not fair to say all people. I have some wonderful friends. Like my two English Major friends who, though I'm not in regular contact with, I hope I remain friends with them forever. That they're not just "college friends" that fade with time. I have my friend Sarah F., who I have come to love. I have a teacher with a daughter around Emily's age that NEVER misunderstood my life or the challenges it comes with. I have The Girlfriend, who loves me for me, and knows I'm a package deal. Then of course, I have Natalie and Alan, the two people that I have chosen to be my family. But these other people, the people that don't understand that I will NOT take my daughter to a bar, or that I won't ditch the park with Emily to go get a cup of coffee, these people that have every right to be selfish and single-minded just do not understand my life. They don't.

I was sitting at this table though, Emily on one side, my teacher on the other and my two English Major friends that I mentioned earlier were on my side of the table as well. One of them had brought a folder full of certificates and she handed them out because a group of English people were all together. They were for Sigma Tau Delta (STD HAHAHA), a sorority/fraternity. Now, don't get me wrong. I am ABSOLUTELY NOT a sorority kind of girl. I hate the concept, the idea, and the ultimate mind-numbing conversation any random girl member tries to have when really, she just wants you to look at her vagina that is plainly visible beneath her literal two-inch skirt. But this one is an English Honors kind of thing. It's a literary kind of thing. A good GPA kind of thing. And everyone at that table that got one, that was a part of this, began talking about using it for resumes and all I could think of is all of the college I've missed out on, all of the college I will miss out on. The dorm rooms, the late night study meetings, the carefreeness to stay up until four am without worrying about your job the next day, the ability to live on ramen and condiments because there isn't another mouth to feed. All of that.

I know that some of what I've mentioned that I know I'm missing sounds tremendously idealistic, brochure-like, but I really am a nerd. Really truly. My friends and I would phonetically transcribe pages of book for practice and fun. We call each other over the summer to discuss the grammatical structure of Shakespearean phrases, we really very much enjoy the learning process.

While I was sitting there, I got really really sad. I was sad because this tremendous teacher, this man who has had more influence on my life than he can even know, is leaving this school that really benefits from his teaching. I was sad because Emily was two steps away from being that kid. I was sad because I was tired and sun burnt and while I really wanted to be part of the going away party, I also really wanted to just go home and be alone and not be required to talk to ANYONE because I had talked all day at work. But I was really really sad when I saw those certificates going around. That is a group I want to be a part of. I want to be able to just go to school, to maybe work a part time job to pay for fun things or car insurance or whatever. I want to be able to focus on my education, I want to be able to plan my life around classes and not the other way around. I want to study, go to the library, sleep past 5 am on a weekday. I want this life, and I want it so badly that I almost teared up at the table. I got angry when someone said "Oh my God! Why don't I ever see you! You miss out on so much!" Because, really? Do you think I'm fucking unaware?

I love Emily. And most of this is completely irrelevant without the presence of Emily. Before her I was very carefree and irresponsible. I didn't hurt anyone but myself, but in hindsight, I hurt myself a lot. I dropped out of a great school in Chicago to drink, to party, and then I got pregnant. Without Emily I would most likely not be alive to write in this blog, to aspire to go to school, to want to make something of myself. Before her I didn't care and genuinely didn't believe I would live past about twenty-three or twenty-four. So, Emily is the only reason I even have the wants and desires and dedication that I have. She is the reason I'm not sleeping in parks and working at a hot dog diner. She is the reason I wake up, keep a stable job, try to work on fixing my credit, have a somewhat regular diet, looked for a relationship that would actually be worthwhile instead of staying in one that wasn't. Emily is, literally, my everything.

I don't mean that in the typical "Well MY Emily is my EVERYTHING" kind of way. Not in a proud way, because I feel like I don't deserve her. Every day, every single day, I work to reach that. I want to feel like I deserve my daughter. That I deserve the smiles, the unswerving love and devotion, that I deserve the knowledge that I truly am her hero. Because I know I don't. I know there are better mothers out there and I know that I make a lot of mistakes. I know I'll likely make a lot more on this journey. But on top of all of that, I believe that Emily and I were meant to be together in one of the closest ways. I think that, without bringing religion in it, we are truly supposed to be in each other's lives. I think we're going to teach each other a lot.

I also know for a fact that I will complete my education. I know that while money is stopping me now, that it won't forever. I know that I am capable of being a big person in this world, whether it ever gets recognized or not. I know that I will make something of myself and I hope I do it in time to be a good example for Emily. I hope I do it in time for her to have very little memory of poverty. I hope that I am able to influence other people before they do the things I've done, or if not, that I can help them get started again after they thought their lives were over.

But on Wednesday, at that table, my fucking bones were aching with the desire to be in on that group. To not be the outlier with the kid, to not be the only person not in college at the moment, to not be that girl. You know, as in "I'm so happy I'm not that girl. I had to get up and leave because I couldn't handle it anymore. I couldn't handle feeling like I had nothing to contribute, like I had nothing going on that these people could understand.

And today, I thought I was detached enough to write about it. But apparently not, judging the length of this entry, and judging my swollen throat and teary eyes. I've said it before. I suck at conclusions. You'll forgive me, I'm sure.