When I was 10 years old I went on a killing spree; at least that is what I thought. By the time I was 11 I was young and developing bonded relationships with members of my family. This is an important fact since I was adopted within my family. My maternal great grandmother legally adopted me as a baby. Her daughter was my biological grandmother. My grandmother's brothers all regarded me as 'little sis'. My grandmother would snear when I call her my legal big sister. Being ten I had to encounter a lot of grown-up relationships. My "brothers" loved and spoiled me. One of them I saw all the time. He was my favorite. He was funny and kind. In the early part of that year he was violently murdered. I understood loss but not why anyone would want to take his life. In the fall of that year I had started trying to establish a relationship with my biological mother. I of course had questions and a degree of anger for her giving me up and keeping my siblings. Just after school started she fell ill and died just days after her 36th birthday. We we just getting to know each other. December of the same year my adopted father, the only one I had ever known had a massive heart attack and died. Within 10 months all the people I had attempted to show love to died in horrible ways leaving a hole in many lives. I was the common link. The person who's story changed my life also took responsibility at a young age for something she did not do. That woman was Maya Angelou. After being sexually assaulted she refused to speak after he assailant was found dead. She felt that had she not told he would still be alive. Even though his acts towards her were horrific she still felt empathy towards him. She felt responsible for him. Her silence lasted six years. Her life had many ups and down before she became the greatwriter and poet that she was. She took control of her life through all of the bad decisions she felt she made taking the time to mold them into a phenomenal existence. She pushed past all of the negative things that happened to her and the negative things she thought about herself. Growing up I had come to the conclusion I was a horrible person and my love must be tainted. It killed. Instead of verbalizing my feelings I poured them into poetry and stories. Managing my grief I finally realized I had something to say. Something that help people, grow people and most of all let them sing. Sing their stories, heal their pain, speak their truth without shame, without guilt for things they should for give themselves for. My father and I argued the night before he died. I never said good night or I love you. I am encourage now to speak my peace because life is short, regret is vicious, and me, well I was never a killer. I was just a flower waiting to bloom in the most unlikely circumstances because Maya showed me I could.

I have come to the conclusion that if you can help someone you should. This is not always an easy thing to do since you yourself may not be in the best position to provide assistance. Sometimes you are the only person qualified for the task if not for any other reason than you are there. In addition to opening my doors to friends and family when they are in a bind, I also work a job that requires me to put it all on the table. I am an emergency dispatcher. It is not a glamorous position. We get more attention for things that go wrong and little to no attention when we do things right. That is ok. When I signed up for the job it was not to be applauded. It was for one reason. I wanted to help people. I wanted to make a difference no matter how small it may be. My center went from eight-hour shifts to 12 during the pandemic and we have remained at 12s. During disasters I do not have the option to evacuate with my family. I stay behind with my collogues and answer the emergency calls. I have never shied away from being a first responder in person and now behind the scenes. I miss a lot of celebrations and have to live through video replays, or live broadcast on social media. I managed to work a half shift and make it to my grandmother's 100th birthday celebration. The venue was close to my job. Given the hours and the strain of the position we are often short staffed so request for time off is often denied or negotiated. Though this is not an ideal job, it's the job I know I was meant to do. I hear things I can't unhear and "see" things I can't unsee. I have heard last breaths and in the same day I have heard first breaths. To say that I can leave it all at the clock is a statement that is a lie. I sit in my driveway a few extra minutes before going into the house. I try not to make phone calls on the ride home. Sometimes I ride in silence. I can't talk to people outside of the profession because they will not completely understand the dark humor you develop, or why you are cold sometimes. I do this job because I would want someone to answer the phone for my family and be just as caring, just as selfless and just as dedicated as I am in the event that no one is around to assist them. Someone who will comfort them, handle them with the care and attention they need in the moment of chaos. These habits carry over into my outside life because I step in volunteering in my community, helping friends when they can't help themselves and giving my family extra care because I know the moments are not promised. You don't have to know someone to help or want to help them. You just have to know it is what you would want so it is what you do. With my English major I hope to educate, uplift and help others with encouragement, guidance and maybe a little fictional distraction from what the world has become.

I actually had four. I was adopted so I had two mothers and two fathers. I was adopted by my great-grand parents so I had access to my biological mother once it was established with me that I was adopted. She made the decision to give me up to ensure I had a better life, or she was cornered into the decision, depends on the version you get. Either way she was my mother. Everything about me resembled her even though she let me go at four months old. Being five and given an over abundance of adult information a small mind can only form the opinions it is led to believe. I was led to believe my mother did not want or love me. By the time I was 10 I had questions that no one was willing to acknowledge and I had encounters with my biological mother that made me question the ill feelings I had for her. She was quite remarkable. Extreamely smart, beautiful, and very shy. Two days after her 36th birthday she was gone. She had fallen into a coma weeks before. I was the only one of my sibling to see her in ICU. At 10 the tubes and machines scared me but I sat with her in silence holding her hand. That was the last contact I had with her. Four months later in December my adopted father and I had a bit of a spat. Not uncommon for a daddy's girl who could not understand why she had to go to bed so early. Needless to say I went to bed, mad at him because I could not get my way. The next morning was a Monday. The urgent yell of my adopted mother woke me. My father was having a heart attack. The ambulance came and I was taken to school because this was not his first heart attack and he would be fine, like all the other times. The nurse called me to the office where my mom(adopted) was on the phone and the only words she could say was "He's gone". In two months time I had lost two very important people to me, both parents and I felt responsible. If I hadn't been mean to either of them would they have lived? Of course this was the thinking of a child, but everyone around me was also consumed in grief and never considered I might be a mess. Over the next ten years I was consumed with regret and emptiness. There were answers I was never going to get, relationships that would never be able to be repaired, and more relevant now, I can not share the successes, the joys, and the pains of my life. It is apparent yearly how much I need them and the support they would have supplied. I still shed tears, my heart is still broken. I know I am not responsible for their deaths. I know that they live inside my heart. I am blessed to still have my biological father, with whom I have developed a wonderful relationship. Even when I win I am often the shell of the 10 year old girl who lost two parents.

The doctor kept asking me if I was a smoker. The answer was no. I was about 32 laying in the emergency room. A large portion of my lung was blacked out from the sizeable clot on the x-ray. He was starting to use words like cracking my chest open, and surgery. All things I had never encountered. A single mother of one I was terrified. They gave me oral and shots to aggressively shrink the size of the clot. Luckily this worked. I spent some time after on blood thinner and was taken off about a year later. I had initially thought it was pneumonia and was glad I left work that night and went to the urgent care. They immediately sent me to the hospital. The compromised breathing was excruciating. It was a pain I would never forget or wish to experience again. The culprit was found to be the birth control that I had started three months prior. In a world that was cresting on the rise of a global pandemic, I was an essential worker. This meant that I had to mask up and go to work. I had not personally known anyone who had died. There were stories, some real, some exaggerated. I made it through the first waves untouched. i followed the guidelines. I stayed home. I was working third shift so while some of the world was experiencing cabin fever I was asleep. As the months turned into a year people were starting to go out and attempt some sense of normalcy. I was still being especially cautious since I had older family members and a husband with a compromised immune system. There were, of course, those around me that felt invincible and were traveling and socializing more that recommended. That is what led me contracting Covid 19. Luckily I was not being hospitalized, simply quarantined. I developed Optic neuropathy, which means I went blind temporarily in one of my eyes. There I was in my bed and I felt it. I was sure it was indigestion. I wanted it to be even though I wasn't eating enough to cause that. No matter what position I got in I could not get any relief from the pain. The pain was horribly familiar. It was unmistakable. This was a blood clot. Upon arriving at the hospital they were curious as to how I could be so certain. That is a pain you never forget. Again, plenty of blood thinners, a hospital stay and I came out on the other side with my vision and my lungs. The only difference is now and for the rest of my life I have to take blood thinners daily. I watch what I eat, activities I take part in, and am extra careful not to cut myself on anything because the bleeding constant even on blood draws. Something as simple as being responsible with my reproductive health set this all in motion. It does not impair my quality of life. I simply shouldn't ride rollercoasters or go paintballing, karate, boxing or extremely long flights. I did ask and if I want a tattoo I have to come off the meds prior and go back on after. It is a very intriguing journey I am on. Being able to write about these experiences have not only helped me, but aided others in information and finding ways to cope with things they never wanted in life. None of my illness has been in vain. My writing will help even if it just creates smiles.